


let it happen

by makeapointofhavingfun



Category: The Seven Realms Series - Cinda Williams Chima
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-18
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-27 10:55:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6281779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/makeapointofhavingfun/pseuds/makeapointofhavingfun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This fandom is tiny so here have a dumb cat/dancer college au</p>
            </blockquote>





	let it happen

OCTOBER

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!” The voice carried down the echoey hall along with the shuffling of feet and the tinkling of glass. There was a thump and a loud shatter, followed by an angry shout. Dancer turned the corner to see a girl about his age with messy hair barely contained by an elastic setting down a flimsy cardboard Costco box overflowing with bottles. She was trying to pick up the broken pieces of what he assumed was the source of the shattering sound he had just heard.

“Do you need some help?” he called down the hall. Her head whipped up at the sound of his voice with a look of panic in her deep brown eyes. 

“Uh… yeah,” she answered, deflating with a heavy sigh. He walked over to where she crouched on the floor and began assisting her in picking up what turned out to be a bong of some sort. She picked up the box again, almost breaking about four empty beer bottles as she shifted its weight around to get a secure hold. He grabbed what he could and followed her to the stairs.

“So… is there a reason for all of this? Art instillation? Religious conversion?” he asked as he started down the stairs beside her.

The girl rolled her eyes. “I heard the dons are doing a check tomorrow. I’ve already gotten in trouble once, I don’t wanna deal with that shit again,” she huffed out between laboured breaths as she hobbled down the dark, mouldy stairs. There had already been more than one incident of people falling in the badly lit staircase, but no one was bothered enough to do anything about it.

“Do you really need throw all this out? Couldn't you have just put it in your closet or something? Blevins doesn’t usually care that much.”

“Blevins doesn’t. Annamaya, however, does. She’s the one who does my half of the building.”

“Annamaya? Oh man, that sucks,” said Dancer emphatically. He had heard only bad things about the West Wing’s don.

“Yeah. She’s super religious too, so not only do I get in trouble with admin, I get a sermon from her, as well,” the girl complained as she walked outside. Dancer grunted in acknowledgement, pushing the door open with his shoulders and trying not to drop anything. The light was dazzling after being inside the dim residence building. The bright sunlight revealed the girls eyes to be a deep, soft brown, her eyebrows to be harsh and unforgiving, her mouth to be sarcastic and teasing. The way she looked at you made you want to impress her. There was a brisk fall breeze. Dancer resisted the urge to shiver.

“Hey, I don’t think I have any classes with you… what’s your major?” he asked. He was sure he would have remembered her face if he had seen it before.

“Music.”

“Oh…I see,” he said as he threw her broken bong in the dumpster.

“Don’t start,” she said, rolling her eyes. Her eye caught on the broken bong and she sighed, muttering something rude under her breath.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“What are you in, anyway?” she asked, scowling at him and slamming the doors open.

“Engineering,” he answered. She scoffed.

“Of course. As an engineer, obviously you have the right to piss on any other major.”

“No! Music is a perfectly good major!” he argued. “I mean, not as good as engineering, but…”

She huffed and rolled her eyes (clearly her opinion on engineering) as Dancer’s eyes adjusted to the dim light.

“I’m Cat, by the way,” she said, stomping her way up the stairs.

“I’m Fire Dancer. You can just call me Dancer.” She raised her eyebrows a little at his name.

“Okay… Dancer,” she replied dubiously. “Why did you help me out anyway? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“At the moment, no. My roommate’s girlfriend is over, so I have literally nothing to do until she leaves,” he explained as they walked down the hall, presumably towards Cat’s room.

“Ha! It’s a good thing you guys have Blevins. If Annamaya caught me with a guy she’d probably rip his junk off. You should see her with her boyfriend, they’re so awkward. They just, like, sit there. They hold hands sometimes, when they’re feeling wild. I don’t think they’ve like, ever kissed.” A grin spread slowly across Dancer’s face from the guilty but unmistakable pleasure of gossip as Cat dramatically described the don.

“This is my room,” she said, stopping at a door with a standard whiteboard on it, reading, “PLEASE STOP PUTTING PADS ON MY DOOR” in messy, angry letters.  
“What’s that all about?” he asked, a laugh in his voice. 

“What?” asked Cat. He pointed at the board and she laughed. “Oh, yeah. They weren’t used or anything. Honestly, I don’t know what she’s mad about.”  
He giggled a little and leaned against the cold brick wall.

“Well, at least she said please.”

“To be honest, she’s taking this a lot better than I would.” Cat answered with a pensive nod.

“What would you do?” Dancer inquired, one eyebrow quirking up at her expression.

“Put used pads on her door,” Cat replied after a moment’s deliberation.

“I… seriously?” Dancer asked, supremely grossed out.

“Yeah, maybe,” Cat laughed. “Or maybe I would just put, like, sauce on them so it looked like they were used, that’d be funny. Oh, man, I should’ve done that in the first place!”

His eyebrows raised and a breathy, bemused laugh escaped his mouth.

“Dancer! Hey!” someone shouted from down the hall interrupting the conversation.

“So that is actually your name?” Cat asked him with wide eyes and a hint of a smile.

“Yeah?” he called out to whoever was trying to get his attention, ignoring Cat’s question. “Oh, Raisa!”

“Who’s that?” Cat asked, narrowing her eyes to see the tiny girl walking in their direction.

“Roommate’s girlfriend,” he answered.

“Ooooohhhhh….” Cat crooned lecherously. 

“Oh, hey! I’m Raisa,” she said, introducing herself to Cat.

“I’m Cat,” she greeted with a wave.

“Nice to meet you,” Raisa replied. She had ridiculously impeccable manners sometimes, a result of a far more classed upbringing than most others at Odensford. Even when casual, she still had a regal air about her (despite her height).

“Huh,” started Cat, a mean looking smile growing on her face. “You know, you have a really nice glow.”

Dancer snorted and tried (badly) to cover it up as a cough. Cat openly laughed at him. Raisa looked back and forth between them for a moment before giving up.  
“Anyway, so… you can go back to your room if you want. I gotta get going or Amon’ll kill me, so, bye,” said Raisa before turning and leaving with a wave. Dancer returned the wave, then turned back to face Cat.

“So… unfortunately I have a shit ton of homework.”

“As do I, Dancey-Pants. Other programs do work and give out assignments, too, you know.” Dancer snorted again. “See you around, I guess,” said Cat as she opened her door. She stepped inside and offered him a small smile and a wave, which he returned, before stepping into her room and shutting the door.  
Dancer started to make his way down the hall, but stopped only a few steps away from Cat’s room before turning around and knocking on her door. She answered looking surprised and a little confused.

“Don’t call me Dancey-Pants.”

“You got it, Danny-boy,” replied Cat with a lazy, teasing grin.

“Don’t call me that either.”

“Okay, Dunkaroo.”

“That doesn’t even sound like my name.”

“See you later, Dick.”

“That was just unnecessary.”

“Seriously, Dancey-Pants. I got work to do.”

“Okay, bye,” Dancer said, resigning himself to being called Dancey-Pants for who knows how long. He was smiling on his way back to his room, though.

 

***

 

“Would you name your kid Dancer?” Cat asked Han as she walked into his room the day after meeting Dancer and landed heavily on his unmade bed.

“Sure, Cat, come on in. How are you? Oh, I’m fine, thanks,” Han said sarcastically from his seat at the desk on his side of the room. After a beat, “Wait, what were you talking about?”

“Would you name your kid Dancer?” Cat repeated, irritated.

“Oh, did you meet him?”

“Who?” Cat raised an eyebrow.

“Dancer.”

“You know him?” Cat asked, both eyebrows raised now.

“He’s my roommate,” Han replied, like, duh.

“Well how was I supposed to know that?” Cat snapped. Han could be kind of an asshole.

“I don’t know. Whatever. He’s my roommate. How’d you meet him?”

“He helped me carry my bottles and shit out to the garbage. Ugh, and I broke my favourite bong.”

“That’s probably for the best, Cat,” said Han. He was so preachy since he got clean.

“Oh, don’t start. Anyway he was nice enough, I guess.”

“That’s generous of you,” Han commented with a snort.

“Hold on… who’s that girl you’re seeing? R… Rebecca?”

“Raisa. And I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Cat laughed. “Come on, Han. You’re not being even close to subtle about this, don’t bother.”

“How do you know, anyways?”

“Dancer said he was kicked out of his room because you were with your girlfriend, and then she came by and fucking introduced herself,” Cat explained mockingly. “You guys clearly aren’t trying to hide this…”

Han looked down.

“You’re not… Han were you just hiding this from me?” Cat asked, bewildered.

“I just…” Han started lamely. Cat sighed loudly and rolled her eyes.

“Seriously? You thought, what, I would be jealous? You’re an idiot, Han.”

“I just didn’t want to fight again.” There was a short silence. Cat stood up and slapped a hand on his shoulder hard enough that he winced. 

“Man… you are a real dick, you know that? What, do you think every girl wants to get in your pants all the time?” Cat snorted. “You getting a girlfriend isn’t going to affect anything, you shithead. Get over yourself.”

“I… okay.”

“So… Raisa. She looked familar, where’s she from?”

“She’s from Fellsmarch, but she went to some fancy private school. She went to the same temple as us though, you might have met her there.”  
“How long have you guys been dating?”

“Only, like, two weeks, we got together near the end of September.”

“What are your intentions with her?”

“I… what?”

“I’m just kidding, god.” Han looked like he was about to reply with something rude, but he was thankfully interrupted.

“Hi, Han. Oh, hey Cat.” This was from Dancer, who had just walked in. He tossed his bag on the floor and kicked off his shoes before planting himself defeatedly on his comparatively neat bed. He glanced between the two of them for a moment. “Do you know Han?”

“Yeah, we went to high school together. I offer my condolences,” answered Cat.

“For what?” asked Han, confused.

“For being your roommate,” Cat explained with a nasty grin. Dancer snorted as he fished around in his backpack.

 

“Come on, it’s not like I’m not a bad roommate!”  
“I met Dancer because you kicked him out so you could fool around with your girlfriend.” Dancer let out a breathy laugh as he pulled a hefty textbook from his bag and dropped it beside him on the comforter. Cat looked back to Han to see him looking genuinely worried.

“It’s not a big deal, Han, don’t worry about it,” Dancer said reassuringly as he tied his hair up in a loose bun, a hair elastic slipping down his dainty (there was no other word for it) wrist.

“Nice man bun,” noted Cat.

“Thanks,” replied Dancer earnestly. He had clearly heard her sarcasm and chosen to ignore it. “Took me a while to perfect.”

“Yeah he looked like a total jackass for a long time,” said Han, earning an unimpressed look from Dancer.

“Wait, how long have you guys known each other?” Cat asked.

“Like, forever. I spent almost every summer with Dancer’s family.”

“Well, Dancer, you’ll be glad to know Han never mentioned you to me during our five years of friendship,” said Cat with false cheeriness.

“And I had never heard of you either,” Dancer replied good-naturedly. They both turned to look at Han. He shrugged.

“I dunno. Never came up, I guess.” Cat shared an exasperated look with Dancer. Han really was a fucking idiot, and Dancer seemed to agree. And yet, they were both still friends with him. Cat shrugged mentally.

She glanced at the clock and her eyes widened. “Shit. I gotta go.”

“Why?” asked Dancer, looking at her with what looked like genuine concern on his face.

“Annamaya’s check. I got rid of all the stuff that will officially get me in trouble, but there’s still a lotta shit in there that I do not wanna get lectured on.” Cat replied as she got up and made her way to the open door, fixing her twisted Kill Bill t-shirt as she went. “Aloha, losers,” she called behind her as she made her way down the hall. Han yelled something probably rude and Dancer said something polite, but Cat was running at that point.

As she jogged down the hall and around the corner to her room she made a mental list of all the things she would hide and where she would hide them: the condoms in the nightstand drawer would go under the mattress, any clothes that Annamaya would deem inappropriate (like 50% of her wardrobe) would be stuffed under her winter things in the closet, and her more explicit compositions would go underneath the loose floorboard. That was where her roommate, Pearlie, hid her lesbian literature. Nobody knew Annamkaya’s opinions on sexual orientation, and they certainly didn’t want to find out. Pearlie figured that with her severe rules about basically everything else that she wasn’t lenient about that, either. 

Cat slipped on the slick tile, arms windmilling as she rounded the corner at top speed. She sprinted desperately towards her room and flung open the door, panting heavily, ready to go-

“Caterina, are these condoms?” Annamaya asked, sounding concerned.

“…yes,” Cat answered. She cursed herself for not coming back to her room sooner.

“Caterina, are you sexually active? There are no boys allowed in your room overnight, you know. I mean, at least your being safe, but please keep in mind-“  
“Don’t worry about it,” Cat answered. “Seriously I haven’t slept with anyone in like… I dunno, a while. Those are just in case.”

“Oh. Okay. But you really shouldn’t be have casual sex,” Annamaya started. Cat sighed, knowing that there was no stopping her now. “It’s dangerous, it’s dirty, it’s… undignified. Please think about the future.”

“I am. That’s what the condoms are for,” replied Cat. She knew this would do nothing but provoke her, but when did Cat ever think before speaking? 

“Oh, Annamaya!” greeted Pearlie as she walked in the room, sounding surprised, as if she hadn’t spent an hour scouring the room for hiding places the day before. “Doing a room check?”

“Yes, Pearlie. I already checked your side of the room, you’re clean. Pearlie, can I count on you to tell me if Cat gets into any trouble?” said Annamaya, waving the box of condoms to indicate exactly what she meant by “trouble”.

“Oh, uh… sure thing, Annamaya,” responded Pearlie awkwardly as she began to close the door behind her.

“No need, I was just leaving,” said Annamaya as she made her way across the small room, fluffing her neatly styled curls with an air of superiority. Cat fiddled with the ends of her own messy hair, a mite self-consciously. 

“And Cat,” said Annamaya as she was halfway out the door. “The same goes for you. You tell me if Pearlie gets into any boy trouble, okay?”

“Yup. Sure. Definitely. I will do that,” Cat answered, offering a thumbs up and a smile she hoped was reassuring and not manic, herself being on the verge of hysterical laughter.

“Pffffffffffffft,” the laugh came out in a series of gasps and convulsions after Annamaya closed the door. Cat glanced over to Pearlie to see her face contorted in either mirth or pain (probably both), her hand covering her mouth as she stared at the door.

“Don’t… don’t get into any guy trouble, now, Pearlie,” Cat gasped out. “Don’t go sleeping with every guy on campus, okay?” It wasn’t that funny, really. Cat was just astonished that Annamaya had even considered Pearlie, a slightly prudish lesbian, would ever get into “boy trouble”. How clueless was she? Cat flopped backwards onto her disaster of a bed, forcing the last laugh out of her with a breathless huff.

“Thanks for saving my ass, though,” said Cat when she was sure the hysterics were gone. “Annamaya probably would have murdered me.”

“Yeah, I could tell. You really shouldn’t mouth off like that, Cat. I know she gets on your nerves, but it gets you nowhere being rude,” said Pearlie, sitting down on her immaculate bed and unbraiding her gorgeous red hair.

“I knooooooow… she just pisses me off, man. She’s so judgmental.” Pearlie raised a pale eyebrow at that.

“What?” demanded Cat.

“Nothing, it’s nothing.”  
“Whatever,” she muttered. It clearly was not nothing, but Cat was too lazy to push any further. She put on her headphones and listened to something loud until she fell into an exhausting sleep.

 

***

 

The Friday after the room check Cat had dinner with Han. They sat across from one another at the slightly sticky cafeteria table with hard plastic digging into their legs, devouring their mediocre food with a shared ferocity. They were quiet save their aggressive chewing for several minutes until Han broke the silence.

“So, the other day, when you came into my room?” he started, running his fingers through his pale hair.

“Uh-huh?” Cat mumbled around her sandwich.

“What were you going to say?”

“What?”

“You came in and asked me if I would name my kid Dancer. If I didn’t know Dancer, what would you have said?”

“I… I dunno. I think I just wanted a second opinion on, you know, whether or not he was cool.”

“Is he?”

“Cool?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re the one who’s friends with him.”

“Yeah, but what do you think of him?”

“I don’t know, Han. I’ve only had, like, two conversations with him.”

“Well, what’s your opinion so far?”

“Man, why do you care so much?” asked Cat, irritated.

“I just want you guys to get along,” replied Han lamely. Cat rolled her eyes dramatically.

“I’m sure we’ll get along just fine. Calm down, seriously.” 

Cat took a sip of her coffee and examined Han. Back when they had been dating they fought constantly, arguing passionately about every little thing. It wasn’t like they never fought now, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as it used to be; more like bickering than actually fighting. What was it that made them work so badly together? Cat suspected that teenage hormones had come into play, but really it boiled down to their different views on relationships in general. Han was perfectly fine with flings and one night stands, but Cat committed herself to any person she was with. She was fully dedicated to her relationship with Han, and then again to Velvet a year later. Han’s lukewarm feelings about them infuriated her, resulting in a disaster of the relationship.

So, they figured they were better off as friends. The standards for friendship were more simply defined, the requirements more easily fulfilled. Sure, it had hurt, at first, but that faded in time. The pain Velvet had caused was still there, but now it was more like a bruise than the stab wound it had been the year before.  
“Well your track record for getting along with people isn't exactly top notch, you know,” said Han, turning to teasing when he didn’t know what to say, as usual. Not that Cat was much different. She gave him an obligatory roll of her eyes and took a sip of her coffee.

“Too bad we can’t go home for Thanksgiving,” said Cat, suddenly remembering what she was missing at home.

“Yeah, I guess,” replied Han offhandedly. “ I just… don’t really want to talk about it right now, to be honest. I’d rather not think about it.”

Cat nodded. She understood. She did want to talk about it, but she knew how bad homesickness could be. They fell into a short silence, before Cat decided she should probably lighten the mood.

“So…” she began with a mischievous grin forming on her face. “This Raisa, huh?”

Han released a long, irritated sigh. “I knew this was going to come up again,” he mumbled.

“You said she was from Fellsmarch, but how did you guys meet?” If it was anyone else, Cat probably would have made some joke like, “how did you get her to agree to date you?” but unfortunately she revoked her right to make fun of Han’s girlfriends that time she, you know, became one.

“Well we sort of knew each other back home, and then we ran into each other on the quad… I don’t know we just started hanging out. And then hanging out romantically.”

“And then sexually,” finished Cat before taking an enormous bite.

“I… yeah.”

“What program is she in?” she asked messily around a mouthful of ham and swiss.

“Why?” asked Han, furrowing his brow.

“Cause I want to know who my friend is banging, Han. It’s a natural curiosity.”

“She’s doing polisci, I think.”

“Well the other engineers must not know, then, or they would have lynched you by now.”

“Ha ha. You know…” Han was probably about to launch into some explanation about the history and dynamics of the engineering society, so Cat quickly interrupted him.

“So are you guys like actually dating, or just hooking up?”

“Like, for real dating.”

“Oh, well, good.” Han hadn’t actually dated anyone since they broke up. Cat had been worried that her intensity during their relationship had ruined him for dating forever, and was glad that he was finally getting over it. She laughed at herself. Who's full of themselves now?

“Why is she so short?” asked Cat, remembering the tiny form from earlier in the week. Han snorted.

“I don’t know, but don’t mention it to her. She wouldn’t take it kindly.”

“No short person would.”

“It’s not like you’re a giant, Cat.”

“No, but I’m also not a hobbit,” countered Cat with a tiny smile. Nothing better than getting Han riled up over something stupid.

“She is not a hobbit.” insisted Han, irritation clearly growing, much to Cat’s delight.

“Oh, yes, she is.”

“Who’s a hobbit?” asked a voice beside them. They both jumped and whipped their heads around to find the hobbit herself standing next to their table wearing a look of mock innocence.

“No one,” replied Han, just as Cat said, “You.”

Rasia raised an eyebrow along with the corner of her mouth at Han, who was clearly transfixed by her startlingly green eyes. “Well,” she said coquettishly. “At least you were defending me.” Han’s smile returned at that. Cat rolled her eyes. Han looked like an idiot. Raisa sat down beside Han and began picking at the hollowed-out carcass of his lasagna. 

“How come you never eat the cheese? It’s the best part,” asked Raisa, proving her point by shoving an impressively large chunk of the stuff into her mouth. Han was watching her intently as she chewed, and she was watching him back. Cat cringed.

“‘Cause then you can come and eat it for me,” answered Han with a dumb grin on his face. Raisa smiled in reply after swallowing. Cat made a gagging sound, but neither of them noticed. Raise leaned up and kissed Han, and he kissed her back. When they broke apart they both giggled, actually giggled, a gross, puppy love kind of giggle. Cat couldn’t keep the disgusted look off of her face.

“You guys are gross…” complained Cat, but they were kissing again.

This time when they broke apart Han asked, “Hey… wanna get outta here?” in a quiet, conspiratorial voice. Raisa smiled sleazily in response. Han stood and helped Raisa up from where she sat, the two of them half-laughing the whole time. They walked hand in hand out of the caf, leaving Cat dumbfounded. Did that really just happen?

Cat frowned, and solemnly finished her sandwich. She was irritated and hurt and lonely, she couldn’t believe Han had just ditched her like that. How could he be so rude? She scowled at the half-eaten cheese on Han’s plate. Han had just left her with his trash while he and Raisa did God knows what in his room.  
“Is that Han’s?” asked a voice behind her, Dancer’s, startling her out of her daze.

“Oh. Hi. Yeah. You want it?”

“Hmmm. I’m afraid I’m not a fan of soggy cheese. May I sit?”

“Oh, I don’t know if there’s enough room,” she replied, gesturing to the empty table. Dancer sat down at her left and sighed heavily.

“He is pretty inconsiderate. When I met you, that was the fourth time he’d done that,” said Dancer, staring at the lasagna.

“Asshole,” muttered Cat. Dancer huffed a breath out of his nose. She glanced over and saw the corner of his mouth quirk up a fraction. He turned and met her gaze with his bright blue that contrasted so elegantly against his brown skin. His slender hand came up to tuck a stray piece of hair behind his ear.

“He can be, yeah,” he said quietly, looking back at the lasagna.

“God… they are so fucking sappy. It’s disgusting,” complained Cat. Dancer made a little amused sound and rested his chin on his hand.

“Have you ever heard Han call Raisa his princess?”

“No. And I don’t want to, ever. Ew. Oh my God. Ew.” Dancer laughed lightly at her horror.

“Yeah, they’re totally obsessed with each other.”

“I gathered.”

“It’s kind of annoying how often he makes me leave so he can spend time with Raisa, but… I mean, I don’t want to be rude.”

“Why not?” asked Cat, a metaphorical lightbulb metaphorically buzzing on above her head. The idea wasn’t brilliant, not even close, but it was a dick move.  
“What?”

“He’s being rude, why can’t we be rude? He just left me all alone in the caf and then kicked you out of your room, not for the first time, so that he can bang his girlfriend. Why can’t we be a little rude back?”

“Cat, I don’t know…”

“Come on,” said Cat, suddenly filled with an angry energy. She grabbed the cold lasagna and Dancer’s hand and carried them both out the door and towards the residence building. She felt good again as she raced across the quad, her heart pumping, laughter building in her chest like soap bubbles, Dancer’s cool hand clutching her warm one as he struggled to keep up.

“Okay,” Cat said, mostly to herself, and began her careful ascent of the rickety fire escape that crumbled away on the side of the grey building, lasagna in hand. She carefully counted the windows she passed until she reached Han and Dancer’s room. She peaked through the window to see Han and Raisa on Han’s bed, certainly distracted. She dug her fingers into the edges of the window and pulled it open as quietly as sh could. Slowly, she slipped the lasagna onto the windowsill. As she went to close the window, it slipped from her fingers and banged shut much louder than she would have liked. She heard a muffled “what was that?” from inside the room and stumbled down the fire escape as fast as she could without dying. 

She was laughing uncontrollably by the time she reached the bottom, tripping over the last stair and falling onto Dancer in a fit of badly restrained giggles (the fun kind, not the gross kind). Dancer was laughing too, then, and he held her up as she threatened to collapse. This laughter was less like soap bubbles and more like a coke can being shaken. Her laughs weren’t lifting out of her effortlessly, but being forced out between gasps, fizzing out of her and dripping all over the place.

“Let’s go!” Dancer half laughed, half whispered. The two of them stumbled off towards the quad in the hopes of looking innocent. They sat down on a bench, shivering with anticipation of being caught, and then just shivering for real when they realized that the sun had started to set and it was, you know, mid-October. After about five minutes, well after they had both calmed down, Dancer spoke.

“You don’t think they’re still…?” he asked quietly, putting his hair behind his ears again.

“Yup. I put a lasagna on the windowsill, and they decided to keep banging. What did we expect, really.” Dancer nodded and hummed his agreement and the two were silent again for a minute or so.

“Okay so…. it’s really cold,” remarked Dancer with audibly chattering teeth.

“I’m glad one of us had the balls to admit that we’re both fucking babies,” laughed Cat as she got to her feet.

“Just because we’re from up north doesn’t mean we’re immune to cold,” he replied, following her lead back to the building.

“I wish.” Dancer rubbed his arms aggressively as they raced towards the glowing beacon of warmth. The night was gorgeous, but unfortunately neither of them had planned for the weather. They ran inside and sighed in simultaneous relief as warmth washed over them.

“So… do you think they’re still in there?” asked Dancer hopefully as they made their way down the wall.

“Probably, yeah,” answered Cat. They’d only been there for, like, twenty minutes. Dancer sighed heavily in resignation, so Cat took pity on him. 

“You could hang out in my room for a while, if you want,” she offered.

“I think I’ll take you up on that.”

 

***

 

Cat’s roommate was busy, too. When they arrived at her room the door was locked, much to Cat’s distress, as she didn’t have a key. She knocked quietly, and when no answer came, pressed her ear against the edge of the door. Whatever she heard made her cringe and go, “Ugh.” So the two of them were aimlessly wandering around the halls on a Friday night, being too cold and lazy and tired to go out and do something.

“Is this a maintenance door?” asked Cat, referring to an unmarked, dingy slab of brown metal stuck into the grey concrete wall.

“Dunno,” answered Dancer lazily. It certainly didn’t look worthwhile. Cat tugged on the old door, which emitted an awful shrieking sound as it struggled open. Dancer winced, worried that it would wake someone, before remembering that it was only, like, seven-thirty. Or something. He’d left his phone in his room when he raced out of there to escape his impressively horny roommate.

Cat fumbled around the wall inside wherever it was the had just opened a door to, Narnia or Hogwarts or Middle Earth or something. A harsh fluorescent light spilled out from the room at the sound of a click and an “Aha!”. The room, as it turned out, was actually a narrow, steep staircase. Which, of course, Cat began descending immediately.

“Come on, Cat…” whined Dancer lamely.

“Come on, Dancer…” retorted Cat intelligently. Dancer rolled his eyes but followed her anyway. They thumped their way slowly down the dangerously sloped steps, Dancer all the while cursing Han. He could be studying right now, but instead…

Cat reached the bottom of the stairs first, letting out a bright noise of pleased surprise. Dancer arrived at the ground a second later and discovered that they had found what appeared to be an ancient rec room, equipped with all the essentials, a half-broken TV, a pool table, and a collection of incredibly ugly furniture. Cat strolled across the room and picked up a… pool… stick thing… and twirled it around with surprising deftness. She made a little excited noise and sped over to a worn piano that Dancer hadn’t spotted earlier. Her Velvet Underground sweater rode up a little above her jeans as she sat on the stooping bench. Dancer moved softly over to sit next to her.

“I assume you play?” he said, tucking an irritating bit of hair behind his ear for the millionth time. Cat nodded.

“For nine years. I’m going for my teacher’s certification this year.” If she had been hoping to impress Dancer, she had succeeded. He had no musical skill of his own; the ability to carry a tune or play any instrument was akin to a superpower in his eyes. She tapped out something light and upbeat, something nothing like her. Dancer watched her nimble fingers stroll across the keys, astonished by the way they moved almost casually, as if this was as easy and natural as making a sandwich or flipping someone off. He saw one of her fingers slip, letting a discordant note into the smooth melody. She swore quietly and took her hands off of the piano, letting them fall into her lap.

“Sucks that we can’t go home this weekend, huh?” she said after a moment’s silence. She had been looking down at her lap, but brought her eyes up to look at Dancer as she spoke. 

“Yeah,” he replied, moving his eyes away from her, deciding to look at the piano ( and putting that piece of hair behind his ear again). “Too bad scholarships don’t cover flights home.”

Cat nodded a little solemnly. Her eyes were far away and detached, staring at the piano without really seeing it. They were both silent for a moment as they let themselves marinade in self-pity. Fellsmarch was too far away for either of them to go home, and it hurt now more than ever as all the kids from nearby cities went home for the long weekend. Dancer missed his mother even more than he had expected, realizing only now how much he had depended on her.  
“I never really realized how much I love Fellsmarch until I left it,” murmured Cat. Dancer glanced at her, a little surprised. He didn’t know her very well, but she had never seemed like the sharing type. Cat seemed surprised too, but didn’t say anything else. Her eyebrows furrowed, seemingly unconsciously, and she looked down at the hands in her lap as if they were unfamiliar.

“It’s a beautiful city,” offered Dancer.

“It’s home,” corrected Cat. There was a short pause before Cat looked up at him and asked, “You’re not from Fellsmarch, are you?”

“No, Marisa Pines.”

“I guess you miss the mountains as much as I miss the city,” she said with a sympathetic smile.

“I guess I do,” he replied with a sigh. Cat smiled at him again.

“Well,” she said. “We have who knows how long to kill, and a shitty TV to kill it with.” She got up and marched purposefully over to the hard, musty-smelling couch, the colour of which seemed to be somewhere between “goose-shit green” and “vomit beige”, and plopped herself down onto one of the questionable cushions with impressive confidence. She adjusted the hem of the sweater, which had ridden up even more when she sat down, and gestured for Dancer to join her. He sighed out of curtesy and made his way over to the monstrosity, flicking off the secondary light switch on the wall on his way.

Cat picked up the brick of a remote which, astoundingly, still worked. The TV switched on with a click and a buzz to a fuzzy picture with a funny colour balance. Static-filled music flooded the dark room, accompanied by orange-faced singers in front of green skies. Neither of them cared enough to change it, so they settled into the dumb old musical with a tired laziness.

Throughout the movie, the two of them slid further and further down the couch until their legs were on top of each other in weird pretzel that neither had intended, but neither minded. Although they hadn’t known each other very long they felt surprisingly comfortable around each other.

They were also surprisingly tired. Weeks of sleep deprivation and stress finally caught up with them, and they fell asleep at eight-thirty on a shitty couch in a shitty rec room in front of a shitty movie on a shitty Friday night.

 

***

 

Cat awoke slowly, noticing one by one every aching muscle in her body. Her face hurt from being pushed against the scratchy material of the couch and her arm was sore from being twisted awkwardly underneath her neck, which, by the way, had the worst crick she had ever experienced.

She opened her eyes to take in the dim rec room. The TV was still on, displaying an infomercial in terrible quality. Frustrated people struggled to find all of their belongings in their cupboards and drawers, but were miraculous saved by this incredible organizational tool. Call now and get two for absolutely free! Cat fumbled around for the remote, which had been wedged in between two of the couch cushions at some point, and turned off the TV with a click and a sudden, oppressive silence.

In this silence she could now hear another person’s breathing and remembered, oh, yeah, Dancer. She twisted her body as much as she could in her painful state to see Dancer, his face smushed completely against the edge of the couch. His mouth was open slightly, his eyelids fluttering, his legs in an impressively weird position. 

She watched with a sick fascination as his head slid slowly off of the edge of the couch, startling him awake with a gasp. He snapped his head up and blinked sleepily at his surroundings. His long hair was a mess, all sticking up on one side of his head. He sniffed as he turned his head toward her, blinking again before smiling slightly.

“Hi,” he said, his voice rough with sleep.

“I thought maybe we could go for dinner before sleeping together, but…” replied Cat, her voice just as scratchy. Dancer rolled his eyes and let out a ppfffftt before dropping his head down onto the arm of the couch with a painful-sounding thud.

“Today’s Saturday, right?” asked Dancer after a moment’s pause.

“Yeah.”

“Thank God.”

“Long weekend, too.”

“Thank God.” Cat offered him a breathy laugh. They lay in silence for a minute longer before Dancer said, “We should probably get up, right?”

Cat groaned, but ultimately agreed. They laboriously lifted themselves into a standing position, their joints stiffer than the couch they’d slept on. She yawned and lifted her arms above her head, popping the bones in her back and shoulders with a distressing level of noise.

“What time is it even?” she asked, touching her hair worriedly. Who knew what it looked like. Well, at least it probably wasn’t any worse than Dancer’s.

“I have no idea. It’s so dark down here… is there even any service?”

“Probably not,” replied Cat. “We could probably survive a nuclear apocalypse down here.”

“It could be like a secret hideout,” suggested Dancer brightly.

“We could get a password. Something cool.”

“Cacao.”

“Perfect.”

“I’ll be President, you be Treasurer.”

“Why do we have to have a system of government?”

“You know what? You’re right. Anarchy.” They high-fived. They tromped up the stairs, Dancer nursing his hand. Who knew he was such a wimp. Cat shoved the door open with her shoulder, exposing them to blinding daylight.

“So… we’ve established that we don’t know the time?” asked Dancer, squinting and furrowing his brow.

“Yeah, I left my phone in my room yesterday.”

“Yeah, me too.” 

“I guess… I mean, should we go back to our rooms?”

“Okay… yeah.” Drowsy and disorientated they wandered back to Han and Dancer’s room. They quietly knocked on the door, wary of what might be on the other side. There was no answer. They knocked again, a little louder this time.

“Do you think she’s still there?” asked Dancer dubiously.

“What building is she in?”

“Wein House.”

“Amon’s their don. He’s super strict, he’s dating Annamaya. There’s no way she stayed the night, unless she has a death wish.” Dancer still didn’t look convinced, but he slowly eased open his door. He breathed a sigh of relief when he looked inside and saw Han alone in his bed. 

“Okay. The coast is clear,” he told Cat over his shoulder. “Not to be rude or anything but… I’m gonna go back to sleep.”

“Good, I don’t want to talk to you. I’m fucking tired.”

“Really? I thought you and tired were just friends.” There was a pause.

“That is… the worst joke I’ve ever heard.”

“Sorry. My brain isn’t really working at full capacity.”

“You are forgiven.”

“Thanks.” They laughed a little at the weird exchange before saying their goodbyes and going back to their respective beds. Pearl’s girlfriend, Talia, was actually still there, but Cat was too tired to care at this point. She dropped onto her bed and mimicked a corpse for a few hours. 

 

***

 

Pearlie awoke to a pair of soft lips on her sternum. They kissed her lightly then moved up towards her collar bone. They inched towards her face, stopping along her neck and jaw before landing on her mouth and staying there. She smiled into the kiss, humming quietly under the pleasant pressure. Finally they pulled away.

“Hey,” said Talia in her gruff, early morning voice. Pearlie thought her girlfriend’s raspy voice was really hot, and Talia used that to her advantage as often as possible.

“Morning,” replied Pearlie with a little smile.

“Glad you’re not going home for the weekend,” said Talia quietly, ducking her head.

“So am I. Not really in the mood for relatives asking if I have a boyfriend,” she answered with a sigh.

“What d’you tell ‘em?”

“Oh, you know. Studying. Uni is a lot of work. That sort of stuff.” Talia nodded.

“Well, it can be pretty tiring,” she leered, placing a sloppy kiss on the shell of Pearlie’s ear.

“That wasn’t even sexy. That was just gross.” Talia laughed through her nose. She leaned forward and licked Pearlie’s jaw.

“Ew!” whined Pearlie, pushing Talia, who was now cackling, away. “Ugh, why am I dating someone so gross.”

“‘Cause I’m hot.”

“You got me there.” Talia laughed again and pulled Pearlie in for another kiss, this one much nicer than the last. Just as Talia was opening her mouth and inviting Pearlie to do the same, Pearlie’s head snapped up with a sudden, sharp fear. 

“What?” asked Talia, irritated but now also tense.

“I think I heard something…”

“You’re paranoid. I’m sure it’s nothing.”

“You would die in a horror movie.”

“Are you saying—“ Pearlie shushed her as she listened intently for footsteps. She looked nervously around the room and noticed a large lump on the bed opposite their’s.

“Wait— Cat?” 

“Cat’s here?”

“Yeah she’s in her bed right now, she’s asleep.”

“How long has she been there?”

“I don’t know… Cat!” Pearly half whispered half shouted across the room. Cat slowly lifted her head and turned to look at Pearlie.

“What… is something wrong?”

“I think Annamaya’s coming!”

“Oh…” she said blearily. “Oh… shit! I’m still in my clothes!”

“You’re still in you’re clothes? I’m completely out of my clothes! And Talia’s still here!”

“Just put her under the bed, or in a closet or something.”

Talia looked offended and opened her mouth to protest.

“Talia,” pleaded Pearlie. She huffed an agreement and started looking for her underwear. As Cat stuffed her jeans under her bed, Pearlie stuffed her girlfriend in the closet. They both jumped into their beds just as Annamaya’s rounds came to their door. It opened with an agonizingly slow creak, Annamaya’s silhouette splayed out across the floor like something from a horror movie.

“Hey, guys,” she said in a soft sweet voice. “I’m not here for an inspection or anything, I just wanted to tell you that I’m going home for Thanksgiving. I hope you guys have a great weekend!”

Cat and Pearlie whispered their goodbyes. Annamaya left and closed the door behind her. Silence. The two of them stared at each other in astonishment for a solid minute before they remembered that Talia was still in the closet. Pearly leaped out of bed wrapped in blanket. Talia, now in her underwear, slumped her self over pearly dramatically.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been in a closet that long,” she complained loudly. Pearly shushed her with a giggle, before leaning in for a kiss. Talia's arms wound around her, her hands reaching up to twist into her hair, Pearlie’s hands grabbing onto Talia’s hips as the kiss deepened.

“Ew,” came a voice from behind them. Cat was sitting up in her bed, looking at their affections with obvious distaste. 

“Fuck off, Cat,” said Talia .

“No, no. We shouldn’t do this while she’s here. I should get dressed, anyways.” Talia flopped backwards onto Pearlie’s bed with an irritated huff. 

“Where did you even go last night?” asked Talia, sitting up suddenly.

“Oh, when you guys kicked me out so you could bang?”

“Oh, I’m so sorry about that, Cat! I should have at least called you first or something, I just…”

“It’s not a big deal, Pearlie. This guy I know was also kicked out by his roommate so we hung out.”

“Oh you guys… hung out?” teased Talia with a disgusting smile.

“Oh my god…”

“Talia, stop it,” begged Pearlie as Talia cackled to herself. Cat rolled her eyes and threw a balled up sock at her. It fell about a foot short and bounced to the floor, causing Talia to laugh even harder, lying back down on Pearlie’s comforter and kicking her feet around. Pearlie started to smile as she pulled on a pair of jeans, Talia’s laugh infecting her with its humour, as always.

“You guys are such dicks,” grumbled Cat.

“You’re the one who’s into dicks, Cat,” giggled Talia. Cat groaned.

 

***

 

Dancer awoke the second time much more rested, but also more cold. He wrapped his blanket tighter around himself and burrowed his head into the cozy cocoon he’d arranged around himself. He wondered why on earth his room would be so cold, but he didn’t want to risk leaving the warmth of his bed to find out.

“Dancer, what the fuck is this?” Han asked, baffled. Dancer slowly lifted his head to look at his friend. He was sitting up on his bed with bleary eyes and a furrowed brow. Dancer followed his eyes to his lap, in which sat a a dirty plastic container. He stared at it in confusion for a moment before it clicked into place. A tiny smile sprouted on his face and grew like bamboo until a full-blown grin spread ear-to-ear.

“…Dancer?”

“Cat put that there,” answered Dancer through giggles at his memory of the night before.

“… Why?”

“She was mad at you for ditching her at dinner to go have sex with Raisa and for leaving your leftover lasagna on the table so she left it on your windowsill last night.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I was there?”

“Well, why didn’t you stop her?”

“Stop her? It was hilarious, why on earth would I stop her?”

“Why were you there anyway?”

“We hung out after you kicked me out.”

“Oh, that’s cool.”

Dancer rolled his eyes settled down to go back to sleep, but found that he couldn’t. Sighing, he sat up and swung his legs out of bed, stiff and uncomfortable from sleeping in his jeans.

“Wait, man, when did you come in?”

“This morning.”

“Oh, okay.”

Dancer waited a moment, expecting him to ask where he had slept, but there was nothing. He sighed again.

“Okay, well… I’m gonna take a shower.”

“Cool,” replied Han as he pulled out his phone.

Dancer tugged open the door to find a girl already standing there, her hand raised in preparation to knock. They both stood there for a moment, staring at each other in surprise. The girl- her name was Hailey, maybe?- then shook herself out of her shock and started speaking.

“Hi. Dancer, right?” He nodded. People didn’t tend to forget his name.

“Okay, so, I was thinking that on Monday all of us from Fellsmarch, or anyone else that couldn’t go home, could have dinner together? Or at least, you know, hang out. So no one spends Thanksgiving alone,” she said quickly. Her tone was purposeful, even when the words were casual. 

“Yeah, that sounds cool. Han?” replied Dancer, turning to his roommate for his answer.

“Yeah?” answered Han distractedly.

“Did you hear that?”

“What? Oh, yeah. Sure.” he said without looking up from his phone.

“Cool,” said Dancer, turning back to the girl at the door.

“Great,” said… Halsey? Hanalea? Heather? “So we can all meet in the caf on Monday evening, then?”

“Sounds good.”

“Kay, see you then.”

“See you.” He closed the door behind her. The entire encounter had been brief, but he was left feeling mildly intimidated, but at the same time like he wanted to be friends with her. She probably did amazingly in job interviews.

“So, are you actually going to go?” asked Dancer, turning around and leaning his back against the door.

“To that thing she was just talking about?” Han glanced up from his phone.

“Yeah.” Dancer wanted clarify that he didn’t mean showing up for twenty minutes before sneaking off with Raisa, but he didn’t elaborate. If that did happen, he was fairly sure Cat would let them know her thoughts on the matter in the form of a leftover turkey in front of the door.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll go.”

“Cool,” he said again.

“Hey, Dancer,” said Han, uncharacteristically quiet.

“Mmmm?”

“What do you think of Raisa?”

“What?” asked Dancer. Was Han having second thoughts about her?

“I mean… I don’t want you to hate her or anything. I want you guys to get along.”

“I don’t hate her, Han. I don’t know her very well,” said Dancer, mentally adding neither do you, “but she seems really cool.”

“Okay. Good,” said Han with a smile that Dancer returned. He was opening his mouth to continue, but Dancer interrupted him.

“I’m sure whatever you’re about to say is fascinating, but I really need to take a shower.” Han laughed a little and let him go.

Upon returning from his shower, Dancer found the door to his room ajar, voices drifting to him from inside. He took a moment to thank every deity man has ever worshipped that he had gotten dressed in the bathroom. He peeked his head around the doorframe to see who Han was talking to, hoping desperately that it wasn’t Raisa. 

He was not expecting Cat.

“I cannot believe you,” she was saying, making wild gestures with her arms.

“Cat come on,” pleaded Han, sounding desperate.

“We slept on a couch. I am not paying thousands of dollars a year to sleep on a couch,” she continued, paying no heed to Han’s despairing attempts to calm her down. “Oh, hey Dancer.”

Cat had just noticed his presence and changed directions so fast he could swear he heard squealing tires.  
“I was just yelling at Han, if that’s okay with you.”

“Help me out here, man!”

“Sure, Cat, that’s fine.” Han made an angry spluttering sound. “I’ll just be over here,” continued Dancer, walking over to his side of the room and sitting down on his bed. Cat nodded to him and turned back to Han.

“That is the second time, that I know of, that you’ve kicked Dancer out of his room so you can bone your girlfriend, and I’ve only known him for, like, a week!” Cat shouted, taking no time to return to her original demeanour. Dancer watched casually from where he sat, absentmindedly combing his hair. Cat was lecturing him about his “stuck-up fucking attitude” and his “rude-ass bullshit, don’t think I haven’t noticed your bullshit” by the time he got to braiding it. Han kept throwing panicked looks in his direction, but he received little sympathy.

As Dancer was tying up the ends of his braids, Cat huffed and said, “Well, that was all I had to say. See you on Monday, or whatever.”

“…Okay,” replied Han, clearly deciding he didn’t want to face any more of Cat’s wrath. She turned to Dancer.

“See you later. Your hair looks nice.”

“Thanks.” Cat walked purposefully out the door, her Doc Martens clunking their way down the hall. Dancer turned to Han, who was glaring at him a little.  
“What?” asked Dancer, letting himself smirk at Han.

“Whatever,” huffed Han, pulling out his phone.

“Who are you even texting?”

“…Raisa.” Dancer had a joke ready, but decided against it. He had probably gotten (and no doubt would continue to get) enough of that from Cat.  
Dancer smiled inwardly at the thought.

 

***

 

Saturday was overcast and dull. The few people still on campus all seemed drowsy and bored, with impromptu naps in the library and hours spent in dorm rooms doing nothing. It was unseasonably warm, in a humid, unpleasant way. Cat spent most of the day staring at her music theory textbook, which may as well have been an old tube of toothpaste for all she was getting out of it.

Sunday came and went with similarly little fanfare, like a poorly organized event with sparse decorations and minimal interest from the participants. No, it wasn’t bad, they would say to their friends the next day. No, it was fine. The food was pretty good, and the music was okay. There would be a short lull in the conversation before a new, more interesting topic arose.

By the time Monday came around everyone was glad to be forced to spend time together. The monotony was lethal, but everyone had been too braindead to do anything about it. The change in pace was welcomed by everyone that afternoon as they gathered slowly in the cafeteria. They loitered around before some bold individual decided to make themselves a plate of food, causing everyone else in attendance to do the same. The volume in the hall rose steadily after that, from a mild hum to a distracting drone. Cat found herself at a table with Pearlie to her left and Dancer to her right. Talia was on Pearlie’s other side, Han on Dancer’s. Raise sat across from Cat with a girl name Hallie, the organizer of this event, wedged between Raisa and Talia on a plastic chair. The chatter was meaningless, but it was a comfort. It reminded her of home.

When all that was left was the dregs of their dinner and the conversation had slowed to a crawl, Cat began to doze off. It was about nine o’clock, and the heavy dinner was starting to take its toll, making her drowsy in a contented, overfull way. Her head slid off her hand, jerking her awake before she could face plant into her sweet potato. Someone nearby snorted. Cat raised her head to shoot them a tired, but scathing glare.

Talia was the culprit, no surprise there. Cat frowned as her evil smirk grew wider. Pearly was joining too, now, with a bit of a grin glancing off her cheek.

“What?” demanded Cat with an unwarranted level of anger.

“You looked cute,” said Pearlie, just as Talia shouted, “You looked stupid.”

Cat glared at Talia with the force of an erupting volcano.

“Why are you so angry?” asked Hallie, looking genuinely baffled.

“It’s the principle of the thing,” shouted Cat in reply.

“Cat must fight anything and everything,” said Talia.

“It’s just her nature,” added Han solemnly.

“You know what—“

“Awww, she’s tired,” said Talia in a ridiculous baby voice. Everyone at the table laughed. Cat’s head nearly exploded.

They wandered sleepily back into Hampton about an hour later. The sun was long gone, leaving behind the newfound chill of autumn. The small gang spoke little. It seemed somehow taboo to break the heavy silence of the lifeless building. Their footsteps echoed like they were at the beginning of a mediocre mystery drama, the murderer hiding behind a pillar or trash can, ready to strike at any moment in some clever and creative way.

They said their goodbyes at Han and Dancer’s door in a way that implied that they were glad to say them. 

“Hey… were you actually mad about dinner? When Talia was making fun of you?” asked Dancer with real concern in his voice.

“Nah, it’s cool. They were right, I do have to fight everyone. I just like to get angry.”

“That’s how Cat gets her thrills. If she’s bored she just yells at somebody,” said Han.

“Fuck off.”

 

***

“You know what this needs?” asked Talia, a manic grin pulling at her cheeks. “Alcohol.” It was Halloween, and they were all gathered in the common room in half-assed costumes with a bunch of others from Hampton eating out of a giant box of candy Hallie had bought. 

“We’re all underage,” scorned Hallie, resting her chin on her hand and giving Talia a Look. “And like, four dons are here.”

“Okay, then let’s go somewhere without dons and bring some booze with us. Cat, you always have a solid stash, right?” said Talia, her desire to be intoxicated not to be stopped by anyone.

“Nah, I got rid of it all a while ago,” replied Cat, producing a large groan from everyone present. She threw her hands up in the air. “It’s not my fault, Annamaya was doing a room check!” Her protests did little to stifle the complaints from around the table.

“Okay, so who here has a fake ID?” asked Raisa, ever the diplomat.

“Cat does, right?” asked Pearlie.

Cat sighed. “I guess since I ended up hanging out with a bunch of nerds I’ll have to buy the alcohol.” The table cheered and raced, en mass, to the doors. They waved a hasty goodbye to the dons, giggling stupidly at their evening plans.

There was a messy exchange of money outside the liquor store as they all tried, and failed, to calculate how much alcohol would be enough be enough for seven people and how much that would cost. Disagreement arose over what they should actually buy, with Talia cheering for vodka, Han hoping for whiskey or something stupid like that, and Raisa suggesting wine (seriously? Who did she think she was hanging out with?). They eventually settled on beer, being cheap and having a reasonable alcohol content.

The guy at the counter frowned at her ID, lifting his gaze to her and attempting to raise an eyebrow. She successfully raised one right back. He gave up.

 

***

 

Cat returned triumphant, lifting the boxes of beer dangerously high above her head. The group shouted again, making the world aware of their presence in the way groups of young people like to do. They made their way back to campus like a pack of hyenas, or maybe like a flock of birds. Either way, they were rowdy and excitable and lacked any kind of reason.

They decided to stay in Wien House, since Amon was hanging out with Annamaya back at Hampton. The small group gathered in the hall, sitting on the floor, trying to look like hooligans and succeeding at looking like losers.

 

“Hey, man. You don’t have anything to drink,” said Cat, dropping down beside him. 

“Yeah, I’m… kind of a lightweight, so I figured I should wait until everyone else was kind of drunk already.” Cat nodded solemnly.

“Good plan. I don’t really feel like cleaning up your puke, so, yeah.” Dancer snorted. Talia was playing something with a heavy beat and autotuned vocals, pulling Pearlie up to join her in her overenthusiastic dancing.

“Talia stop acting drunk, you’ve had like, half a beer,” laughed Hallie.

“Talia’s just used to being fake drunk, she’s too poor to spend money on booze,” Cat explained to Hallie.

“Thrifty,” replied Hallie, taking a surprisingly hearty swig from her own bottle. Raisa got Han to join her on the awkward dancefloor, the four of them aspirationally drunk. Eventually they managed to convince Hallie to join, her dancing somehow stubborn at first, but growing slowly into a careless flow. The alcohol helped.

“You guys, stop being lame!” shouted Talia once she had finished her beer and was actually starting to feel buzzed. “Get up here!”

“You are dancing in a dorm hallway.”

“Fuck off, man. Your name is Dancer, shouldn’t you like dancing?”

“Wow, Talia, that’s, like, super cool and original,” shouted Cat. She apparently didn't realize that Talia was only about five feet away.

“You’re super cool and original!” said Talia. Cat and Dancer exchanged a glance and a quirk of the eyebrow. They both laughed.

“Shut up!” she shouted again. Raisa moved to calm her down.

“Are you sure she’s not actually drunk?” asked Dancer, getting a little concerned. She looked on the verge of tears.

“She’s just a very passionate person, I guess,” answered Cat, followed by a drink. “Okay, how much of a lightweight are you? ‘Cause it sucks drinking alone.”

“Like… pretty bad. If the impression I got from your stash was correct, I definitely can’t keep up with you.” She made a face. “You’re not drinking alone, anyway. Literally everyone else here is drinking.”

“Well, I guess you’ll just have to follow Talia’s lead and get fake drunk, like a normal person.” She stood and offered him her hand, staring at him intently when at first he didn’t respond. He sighed deeply, mostly just for show, and relented.

“Thank God, you guys were such downers just sitting there,” shouted Talia. She had successfully been consoled by Pearlie and Raisa and was dancing in full swing again. Cat stuck out her tongue in response, leading Dancer by the hand to the tiny group.

“Come join us, Fire Dancer!” said Raisa, clearly leaning towards tipsy, slinging an arm around Dancer’s shoulders. Or at least attempting to; she was a good ten inches shorter than he was.

“Cat, if I humiliate myself, it’s your fault,” he called as Raisa started to dance with him.

“Of course, man, I’d love to see you embarrass yourself.” Dancer flipped her off. She laughed.

 

Everyone was drunk. Apparently a couple of cases of beer was enough to get this little group of nerds tipsy. Cat smiled. As if she could talk. She was buzzed, too.

Everyone was drunk… except for Dancer. She narrowed her eyes.

“Here,” she said, handing him a bottle. He furrowed his brow at her and started to say something. “Come on, everyone else is already tipsy. This is the prime time to get drunk.”

Dancer rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically, but took the bottle. “You have a remarkable ability to make me look like an idiot.”

“Awww, thanks, man, but I can’t take all the credit for that,” she replied, punching him in the arm. He scowled at her. Her grin widened. He took a swig.  
“You are now responsible for whatever I do while intoxicated,” he warned, taking another drink. Cat laughed and finished off her own bottle. 

 

Okay, so he wasn’t lying about being a lightweight. After a beer and a half he had to sit down because he couldn’t stand or walk properly. He had told her that she was responsible for his drunk self, so she sat with him, working on her third. Or maybe fourth? Whatever. 

The party had pretty much deteriorated. Hallie had gone back to her room about fifteen minutes earlier, Pearlie and Talia were either laughing or crying about something on Talia’s phone, and Raisa and Han were, in a surprising turn of events, making out at the end of the hall. Dancer was laughing about something she had said. She couldn’t remember what it was, but she smiled at him anyways. He was cute drunk. 

Their costumes had all been mixed up, so Dancer was now wearing Han’s wizard hat, Cat was wearing Talia’s cat ears, and Pearlie was wearing Raisa’s princess crown. Hallie had taken Cat’s pirate hat back to her room with her and Talia was stuck with Hallie’s old fashioned army helmet, while Han was sporting Pearlie’s Anne of Green Gables hat. Raisa had been wearing Dancer’s Groucho Marx glasses, but they were discarded as soon as she and Han had started making out.  
Dancer had stopped laughing and was now looking solemnly at the hallway and it’s inhabitants.

“Pretty lame party, right?” said Cat.  
“It was all right while it lasted,” replied Dancer with a little shrug. He gave Cat a drunken smile. She laughed at him a little. They sat in silence for a long time, and Dancer might have fallen asleep. Eventually, Raisa and Han stumbled their way back to Raisa’s room in a fit of giggles. 

“We should probably all start heading back, right?” said Talia. Everyone agreed. Talia weaved her way back to her room and Pearlie helped Cat get Dancer across the quad to Hampton.

“This is entirely your fault,” he mumbled as they struggled to get him up the stairs. Pearlie wandered off back to their room as soon as they made it up the stairs. Rude.

“Yeah, so you’ve said,” grumbled Cat. They finally made it to his door. Dancer fumbled with the lock for a minute before Cat reached over to do it for him.

“Thank you so much,” he said, his voice thick with emotion, but mostly just with alcohol. He leaned forward and hugged her. She patted his back awkwardly.

“Yeah, man… no problem,” she said, trying not to laugh outright.

“You know what?”

“What?”

 

“You’re a really cool cat, Cat,” said Dancer before going weak laughing. Or possibly crying? Cat sighed.  
“No, seriously, though,” he said once his laughter subsided. “You’re cool. We should hang out sometime, and like, not just because Han and Raisa ditched us. Like for real.”

“Yeah, we should,” she replied with a smile. Yes, they were both fairly intoxicated, but the sentiment was sincere. He hugged her again and smiled.

“See ya later,” he said, accompanying it with finger guns. He wandered back into his room and flopped face first onto his bed without waiting for a response.

 

NOVEMBER

 

“So, were you serious about hanging out, or were you just drunk?” Cat asked over the phone the Monday after the Halloween fiasco.

“I… Cat? How did you even get my number?” asked Dancer, wildly confused. He hadn’t even finished saying hello when she had begun speaking, with no context or preface.

“Han. So, were you being legit or were you wasted?” Dancer considered what she was talking about for a second before remembering hugging her with tears in his eyes and telling her she was cool. He allowed himself a moment to scream internally.

“I mean… yeah. Like I was really wasted, but I was also being legit.”

“Good,” replied Cat, sounding relieved. “Wanna hang out sometime this week? If you’re not busy.”

“I had my last midterm last week so I’m free whenever, basically,” he replied, shoving his phone between his ear and his shoulder as he examined on a circuit board he was working on.

“Don’t you have any extracurriculars?”

“No? Neither do you, Cat, you can’t talk.”

“I know, you just seemed like the kind to be in, like, a million clubs.”

“I think you might have me mixed up with Raisa. I am not that sociable.”

“Thank God.” They both laughed.

“So, coffee?”

“Sure, when?”

“Now, I guess. I’m like five minutes away from the Starbucks on Bridge Street.”

“Seriously?”

“It’s 1 pm. I’m not drunk yet, douchebag.”

“That’s not… whatever. I’ll be there in ten.” She hung up.

 

He was chilled to the bone by the time he pushed open the door of the shop. Cat was already there with her earbuds in, frowning at something on her phone and typing furiously. She didn’t even look up from her phone when Dancer slid into the seat opposite her and took off his coat. She stopped typing and angrily dropped her phone down on the table. He noticed that she had one of those shock-absorbing, super protective cases. No mystery why.

Cat finally noticed him after she had finished glaring at her phone. She ripped out her headphones and smiled at him.

“Yo, what’s up Dancey Pants!”

“I thought we had moved past that.”

“We’ll never move past it. I’ll put it on your gravestone.”

“Thanks” he said. She beamed.

“You know, when I said that we should hang out I basically said, ‘we should do lunch,’” mused Dancer aloud. Cat grimaced.

“Why would you say that? That is literally the grossest phrase in the English language. Please do not associate me with that phrase.”

“You have to come with me to my next yoga class. The instructor is incredible.”

“Oh my god.”

“I found a fantastic new vegan restaurant downtown, you should try it sometime.”

“Please. I’m begging you.”

“And when he told me I had to vaccinate my children, well, I gave him a piece of my mind.” Cat was in pieces now, her head thrown back as she cackled. Dancer was smiling, more in response to her laughter than his own joke.

“So who were you yelling at via text?” he asked once Cat had calmed down a little.

“What? Oh, Talia. She kicked me out of my room again last night so she could have sex with Pearlie.”

“Shouldn’t you be yelling at Pearlie then, since she’s your roommate?”

“I can’t yell at Pearlie! When I yell at Talia she yells back, but Pearlie just apologizes and tries to make up with me, I can’t deal with that.”

“Okay, yeah. I see where you’re coming from, I guess.”

“Thank you. Han refuses to believe that I have any morals of any kind, but I will not yell at someone nice.”

“You have to draw the line somewhere.”

“Exactly. I’m glad you understand.” Cat took a haughty sip of coffee. He smiled. 

“I’m gonna go get something for myself, if you don’t mind.” Cat dismissed him with a wave of her hand.

When he returned, Cat was typing angrily again.

“What happened now? Give me a play-by-play,” he said as he sat down.

“So I texted her first and got mad at her for kicking me out of my room. I had to sleep in that gross rec room.”

“You could have called me, I would have hung out with you.”

“Eh, you were already asleep. Anyway, so then she told me it wasn’t a big deal and I told her that it was a big deal, sleep is fucking important, and she said that I was just mad because I’m single so I’m telling her off right now.” Dancer looked at her screen. She was typing too fast for him to really read what she was saying, but there were certainly a lot of expletives as well as an extreme overuse of capitalization. He waited a minute for her to finish, when she dropped her phone down on the table and angrily drank her coffee.

“So, how are things with you?” she asked, slamming her coffee down with vigor.

“Much better, now that I’m no longer violently hungover.” Cat laughed at that. He tried to scowl but it came out as a smile. Dancer sat quietly listening as Cat complained about the various things people and said or done in the thirty-six hours since they last saw each other. Han said something rude, Annamaya yelled at her when she realized she had been drinking, her next door neighbour wouldn’t stop playing “dumb-ass music”, and of course, Talia and Pearlie kicked her out of her room. The stories were mundane, but Cat’s anger and excessive swearing made up for whatever content they were lacking.

“… so I said, Pearlie, I love you, but you need a new girlfriend.”

“You were kidding, right?”

“Of course I was kidding, I don’t hate Talia that much.”

“Does Pearlie know you were kidding?”

“I certainly hope so.”

“Maybe you should make sure next time you see her.” Cat shrugged.

“So, on Halloween, Han and Raisa went back to Raisa’s, right?” asked Cat, face brimming with cruel anticipation. A smile slid onto Dancer’s face.

“Yup.”

“So Han got his ass beat by Amon, right?” Dancer nodded again, unable to restrain his grin.

“He tried to climb out the window onto the fire escape.”

“And? Did it work?”

“He was hungover and exhausted, of course it didn’t work. Amon just yelled at both of them a little and made Han leave. He hasn’t done anything about it yet, but this is like the fourth time he’s had to kick Han out of Raisa’s room. They are literally the worst at being subtle.”

“As we are both all too aware of.” Dancer snorted and took a sip of his coffee. “Seriously though, I don’t think I’ve ever met a couple as aggressively horny as those two.”

“They certainly are outstanding. It’s too bad they couldn’t put that on a resume.”

“Come on. Don’t they say you can make any skill sound fancy? I’m sure they could think of something.”

“Exemplary copulation skills. Works well with others in erotic situations. Experience in frequent intercourse.” Cat laughed loudly, slapping the table to go along with her uproarious cackle. It took her a minute, but eventually she stopped laughing with a dramatic wheeze. She took a gulp of her coffee.

“I like you, Dancer.”

“Good to know the feeling is mutual.” Cat blinked at him. She took a quiet drink from her coffee and looked out the window.

“Want to get something to eat at the Crown and Castle?” asked Dancer when the silence stretched out a little too long.

“Sure.”

 

***

 

Okay, so the skinny little nerdy guy with the long hair and the slender fingers was actually a lot of fun. Cat didn’t know why she was so surprised by this. She guessed that she would’ve never expected a guy who wears Toms to be as cool as he was.

Cat returned to her room at 10:00, earlier than any guy she’d ever dated had got her home (not that it was a date). They got lunch, hung out for an hour or so, studied together, hung again, gotten dinner, and hung out some more. Cat showed him her favourite bands, Dancer complained about his professors, they both made fun of Han and Raisa. Shared interests are an important basis for any relationship, but nothing makes two people grow together faster than shared complaining.

Dancer was also nicer than any guy she’d ever dated (not that they were dating). Cat felt an ease with him that she hadn’t known was possible. Every interaction with Han had been battle. They were constantly vying to be the smarter, the tougher, the better one. She had never realized that a relationship, especially one with a guy, could be symbiotic. Dancer could pull laughter out of her like it was nothing. She hoped she was able to return the favour.  
Talia raised an eyebrow when Cat said that she had hung out with Dancer all day in that teasing, sleazy way of hers. Cat huffed and Pearlie lightly scolded her. Why was she even there, anyways? Didn’t she have her own room at Hampton? 

She asked this while the girlfriend in question was in the bathroom. Pearlie just shrugged helpfully. 

 

***

 

Dancer and Cat hung out again the next weekend, and the weekend after that, then every weekend that month. They invited Han and Raisa to come along sometimes but were often turned down. 

 

And, okay, so the loud girl with the messy hair and intense stare was way more cool than he would have thought. Maybe he just hadn’t expected someone who did not own a single unripped shirt to be so nice to hang out with.

Cat’s sense of humour (and lack of embarrassment) astonished Dancer endlessly. She laughed loudly and insulted people to their face (to their face!), but it was also the most fun he had had in a while. Han was the only friend he had had coming to Oden’s Ford, with most of his friends and family still back at Marisa Pines. He felt out of place for a while, with many of his peers and even his teachers overlooking him. Cat made him feel like he belonged more than anyone else at the school had. The conspirative look she gave him when she started gossiping made him feel like he was in a secret society or something (was he already? Did the rec room count?), like he was a part of something exclusive. It was nice.

Laughing came to her as easily and naturally as cursing. She lived life a little more intensely than Dancer, which allowed for an interesting dynamic between the two of them. Dancer’s humour was all smirks and sarcasm, as opposed to Cat’s raucous regalement, and they contrasted each other beautifully.  
It was the last Sunday of November, and unseasonably warm. Cat was lying on the floor of Dancer’s dorm, with Raisa taking up most of Han’s bed, Han lounging on Dancer’s bed, and Dancer in the desk chair. Dancer fiddled with his hair as Han and Cat went back and forth arguing about something (some TV show, maybe?). Raisa caught his eye with a sympathetic smile. He rolled his chair over to where she sat with her chin on her hands, watching the showdown with waning interest.

 

“They sure are something, huh?” she said, half affectionate, half exasperated.

“Something is definitely the word I would use to describe them, yes.” Raisa snorted and nodded. 

“And yet here we are, hanging out with them.”

“And making out with them.” She shoved his shoulder, making his chair spin as he laughed. His laughter died softly with the slowing of his chair. Cat roped Raisa into the argument, hoping to get a rise out of her (it worked). Dancer smiled as he watched her sit up and raise an eyebrow at Han’s comment.  
“What do you think?” asked Raisa, turning her attention back to him.

“About what?” he replied, snapping his head around to look at her. She snorted.

“Nevermind,” she said, looking back at Han and Cat with a teeny tiny smile.

 

DECEMBER

 

November departed with little fanfare, leading them into the new month filled with more stress than festivities. Exams were approaching at an alarming speed, leaving no room for holiday spirit.

Raisa barged into Cat’s room complaining loudly.

“I am the most festive person out there, but I can’t even show off my Christmas skills because I have this stupid history paper to write!” she shouted, throwing her notebook across the room and dropping her bag on the ground with probably more vigour than strictly necessary. Not that Cat could really talk.

“Yeah, it is too bad. Do you need help with anything?” asked Pearlie.

“No,” she pouted, plopping herself down in the chair by Cat’s bed with a pout.

“You just need to complain. I get that,” said Cat, pulling her headphones out and looking up from her textbook.

“Thank you,” replied Raisa, accompanying it with a melodramatic sigh. “Anyone want to hear me talk out my thesis on military tactics in the American Revolution?”

“Not in the slightest,” said Cat quickly, picking up her headphones again.

“No, wait, I won’t, I won’t!” cried Raisa. “I need a break, actually. I’ve been working on this damn essay all day. Talk to me about anything other than John Laurens.” She cast about for a second before, “Dancer! How’s Dancer doing?”

“You saw him last week…?”

“But you saw him yesterday, right?”

“Yes…”

“So how is he?”

“Fine…” Raisa seemed frustrated. She sighed again, a little less dramatic this time, but the source of this one was a mystery to Cat. Cat narrowed her eyes at her, but didn’t press. Even if Raisa needed a break, Cat still had to finish this reading for tomorrow. She put her headphones back in as Raisa turned to chat with Pearlie, still wondering, a little irritated, why Raisa cared so much about Dancer.

She looked up a few minutes later, digging her earbuds deeper into her ears to try and drown out the ridiculous giggling coming from Pearlie’s side of the room. Raisa and Pearlie looked back at her with grins manic from laughter. Cat glared in response. Having had quite enough of this silliness, she slammed her book shut and made her way down the hall to someone who’s giggling was not nearly as annoying.

 

***

 

Dancer could hear the clunk of Cat’s heavy boots all the way down the hall as she stomped her way to his room. She swung his door open and walked across the room, kicking it closed behind her.

“Hey,” he greeted. “What’s up?”

“Raisa’s annoying me. I figured you would be doing homework or something nerdy so I could study here.”

“Yup, I’m just finishing up my project for geek class, it’s looking nice and boring,” he said as he turned back to his coding assignment.  
“Perfect, I’m glad it’s going well,” she replied, plopping herself down in her usual spot on the floor next to his bed (since when did she have a ‘usual spot’?). She opened her textbook on her lap and started scratching notes and doodles in the margins. They chatted a little at first, but quickly fell into a silence that came as easily to them as sarcasm.

After about a half hour of mostly silent working Cat announced that she was hungry. The conversation picked up again smoothly as they made their way to the caf, discussing what they were working on (Cat had been reading about the rise of rock n’ roll in the 1950s), what they were watching, what they were reading, what they were listening to… They barely noticed where they were going, guided by habit, engrossed in their conversation. Dancer almost ran into a table while arguing about whether or not My Immortal was a joke (“Of course it’s a joke! She calls Tom Riddle Tom Bombadil, you can’t just do that by accident” “I think you underestimate people’s stupidity, Dancer. I admire your optimism but it’s just unrealistic”) They were waved over to a table by Pearlie and Raisa, who soon joined the conversation. 

“You know, it’s interesting to note the decrease in quality throughout the story. The beginning was weird, and the spelling was awful, but by the end the writing is ridiculous and the actual storyline reads like the screenplay of someone’s dream.”

“Stop pulling English nerd stuff on us, Pearlie. Was it fake or not?”

“A mystery that will most likely never be answered.”

Raisa stabbed her fork angrily into her salad. “I should write my essay on this instead of fucking Yorktown. Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way is more of an American hero than George Washington ever was.”

“As interesting as that sounds, I don’t think Professor Tourant would be as fascinated as we are by Tara Gilesbie’s work.”

“Yeah, ‘cause he’s a boring asshole. And a creep.” Pearlie smiled sympathetically. Raisa pouted.

“If anyone is going to get in trouble for some shitty racial comment someday, it’s him,” said Cat, who had been to a single lecture of his and never went again. The table nodded gravely. 

After a moment, Raisa said, “This salad sucks,” in a subdued voice.

“As much as the military tactics used in the early days of the Revolutionary War?” asked Dancer quietly. She groaned.

 

After lunch, Pearlie and Raisa bundled up and headed off to the library in the vain hope of being more productive in a new location. Dancer and Cat, being far less idealistic, returned to Dancer’s room.

“What are the chances we get anything done versus just doing fuck-all for the next two hours?” asked Cat as they huffed their way through the cold.  
“I’d say about fifty-fifty. Maybe sixty-forty.”

“Sixty-forty which way?”

“I think you know the answer to that one, Cat.” They both sighed upon entering the heated building, slowly trudging their way up the now-familiar stairs. The place wasn’t what you would call home, but it was definitely… something. Cat said as much once they entered Dancer’s room. Dancer agreed, and then they both stared at their homework in silence, neither one wanting to be the first to start working.

“…All in favour of doing fuck-all say aye,” said Cat.

“Aye,” replied Dancer, raising his hand.

“So it’s settled.. no homework for today.”

“You’re a bad influence on me, Cat. I used to be a star pupil, I swear.” Cat grinned. Dancer couldn’t help but grin back. They both kicked off their boots and prepared to avoid reality for the afternoon.

Cat sat down at his desk. She gestured to his laptop and raised her eyebrows. Dancer nodded. She opened and immediately started scrolling through his music.  
“Jesus… is hipster indie folk bullshit all you listen to?”

“Yeah, my personal favourite is ‘Beard Banjos’, or maybe ‘Moody Guitars’.”

"I cannot tell if you're being sarcastic right now."

“Yes, I’m being sarcastic. That stuff is from when I was, like, fifteen. Some of it is my cousin’s.”

“Thank fuck.” Dancer snorted, reclining on his bed and unlocking his phone (one text from Han complaining about some guy at the 7/11, two texts from Pearlie containing pictures of a cat that was hanging out in the library). Cat was tapping away at his computer, muttering quietly to herself. Dancer turned his head slightly to ask what she was doing, but was cut short by a sudden blast of some very aggressive music. Cat swivelled around in the chair and smiled at him as guitars poured from the speakers behind her.

“So, what do you think?” she asked, pushing up the sleeves of her stylishly ratty sweater.

“About what? The screamo?”

“What the fuck. What do you even think screamo is? What the fuck. This is, like, grunge or maybe punk, not metal. Unbelievable.” The last bit was said under her breath, but clearly meant for him to be heard, the entire thing laced heavily with irritation and angry disbelief. Dancer almost hurt himself trying not to laugh out loud and Cat rolled her eyes dramatically in response.

“Okay, but seriously, what do you think?”

Dancer gave it a second. “Might take some processing. You saw what I grew up with. Definitely has potential, though.”

Cat nodded thoughtfully. “Alright, so if this is too heavy for you, you might want to try this instead,” she said, typing something again. The music changed abruptly to something softer and slower. Dancer listened for a moment.

“Yeah, this is cool.”

Cat nodded and smiled triumphantly. She spun around slowly in his desk chair, humming along quietly and tapping to the beat. Dancer’s own smile grew as he watched her become engrossed in the music, her movements becoming more drastic as the song grew in intensity. During the height of the chorus she leapt up from the chair and spun around, her socks slipping on the scuffed-up wooden floor. He laughed as he watched her impressive performance, and allowed her to pull him up from off of his bed into her aimless dance. He tucked his hair behind his ear out of habit before Cat caught his hand and twirled him around, earning another laugh. 

He found it a little difficult to catch his breath again. He wound up back where he started, Cat’s face alive with laughter and exhilaration. He grabbed onto her shoulders to steady himself, stopping and looking at her for a second. She looked back at him. They held their tableau for a moment, neither really sure how to proceed. The song ended, and they both pulled away. Cat drifted back towards the desk, Dancer landed on his bed. Cat huffed in irritation, or maybe disappointment, before sitting back down.

“Anyway,” she said, pulling her foot up onto the chair and resting her chin on her knee. “They’re pretty cool.”

“Thanks,” he said. The room was silent for a moment too long, and not in the comfortable way it usually was with them. Cat frowned. Dancer felt responsible, somehow, so he got up.

“Here, you ever heard of these guys?” he asked, typing a band name into the youtube search bar.

“No,” she replied, squinting, as if suspicious of the fact that Dancer knew a musician she didn’t.

“Here, listen to this.” Cat closed her eyes and listened intently, as she often did with new music. Dancer smiled a little and nodded along to the familiar tune, and things were back to normal.

 

***

 

“I’m done!” shouted Cat triumphantly, dropkicking her bag across the room and throwing her arms in the air like she was walking out of the courtroom after being acquitted. 

“Do you mind?” asked an irritated voice. Yes, Cat had noticed the sock on the door, but had chosen to ignore it in order to declare to as many people as possible that she had finished her last exam and was now ready to celebrate Christmas to its fullest.

“Just forget I’m here, I just have to grab a couple things and then I’ll be out of here,” she said, closing the door behind her and loudly pulling open the drawers of her dresser, a little more forgiving than usual of Talia and Pearlie’s sexual activity.

Talia and Pearlie held a whispered argument as Cat collected what she was looking for and moved onto the closet, with Talia suggesting that they continued with what they were doing before, she said it was fine, and Pearlie calling her an idiot, shut up and put a shirt on. Fortunately, they never had to reach a verdict, as Cat was true to her word and was soon gone to announce her good news to as many people as she could find.

She wandered cheerfully down the hall to Han and Dancer’s, figuring at least one of them could be there. Even the engineers had finished exams before Cat had. Her theory exam had been scheduled on the last day possible, because her professor was clearly an idiot, and she had been in intense emotional pain for the past three weeks.

Finally free work, a week later than half the people on campus, she fully intended to share her elation with every single person possible.  
“I just had my last exam!” she said as she helped a girl wrestle a large suitcase out of her room.

“Nice!” congratulated the girl, thanking her for the help with her bag and steeling herself for her journey down the dreaded staircase.

She flung open the door to Han and Dancer’s room with another, “I’m done!” and received a large cheer from not only the residents of the room, but also Hallie and Raisa. The four were gathered on the floor around an intense round of The Game of Life (Dancer was in the lead with Raisa in a close second. Halllie was well behind but still full of hope. Han had given up ten minutes ago when Raisa told him he couldn’t sell his children and was now terrorizing the other players’ cars with popcorn.)

“So you’re finally free?” asked Hallie.

“I am.”

“Free… to get festive?” asked Raisa, sounding mildly manic.

“I guess?” replied Cat. Raise made an inarticulate sound of excitement.

“Wait, Raisa, why aren’t you going home for the holidays?” asked Hallie. They all knew that Raisa was the only one of them who had the money to fly home.  
She deflated like a balloon when placed in contact with Cat's personality.

“Ugh, my parents split up last year and it’s been super shitty at home… my mom is always on me about my major and her boyfriend is such and asshole. Like, so creepy. They won’t notice I’m not gone, my sister has always been her favourite anyway.”

Han snorted.

“Yeah, same here.”

“Oh my… this truly is an incredible story. Two souls from different walks of life, but equally tragic in their upbringings, finding solace in each other after years of loneliness,” said Cat dramatically. Han rolled his eyes and threw popcorn at her. She cackled her trademark cackle.

Cat settled herself down between Dancer and Han. Dancer leaned forward and spun the wheel. It landed on a ten.

“I don’t believe this!” shouted Raisa, enraged. “This is rigged, I swear!”

“Yeah, that’s like your fourth ten in a row,” grumbled Hallie.

“I guess I’m just lucky,” he said, moving his car up and picking up a Life tile. 

“That’s a lot of kids, dude,” commented Cat.

“Yeah, we didn’t plan on having five kids, but every one is a gift,” replied Dancer. “That’s Jaiden, Kayleeh, Mayo, Rowan, and Enema.”

“They’re… they’re beautiful,” said Cat, struggling to hold back laughter.

“Thank you. My wife, Sharon, went on a diet of entirely yogurt while pregnant with the first two, then switched to lemonade and pita bread for the last three.”  
Raisa finally broke the silence with a loud bark of laughter, leaving the whole circle giggling.

“Did you just describe my mother?” asked Raisa.

“Oh, Jesus, did he?” responded Cat, a little horrified. Raise nodded, gaining her a pitying look from Cat and a sympathetic pat from Hallie. The game continued for only a few more minutes (Dancer won, Raisa was close to tears by the end).

“Thank god, if that hadn’t ended I was going to have to come to terms with the fact that I’m friends with a bunch of people who play Life in their spare time,” said Cat, rolling back and lying down on the hard wood floor.

“Well I might have to come to terms that I’m friends with somebody who doesn’t like fun,” responded Raisa dramatically. “I guess you also don’t like Santa, and Christmas?”

“Well, it’s a holiday appropriated from the pagans by the Christians, and then taken from them by corporations. Our modern understanding of Santa Claus was created by Coca Cola as an advertising campaign. The entire season is a consumerist nightmare.”

“If it’s so horrible, then why do I have a video of you singing Christmas carols to my uncle’s dog while incredibly drunk on eggnog?”

Cat shrugged.

“It’s fun.”

Dancer snorted.

 

***

 

Christmas day itself was rather subdued. Although festive, everyone who had to stay on campus was also missing their family more than ever. Gifts from home were opened with a slight bittersweet tone, reminiscing on family traditions and good food. Even Raisa missed her family (sans the mother’s boyfriend), wishing she could spend the evening with her sister or her dad.

Pearlie had ended up going home (turns out Talia had been saying goodbye when Cat had barged in on them). With her exams over she had no excuse not to take the two hour drive home for the holiday, even as she dreaded every second spent with her extended family.

The little forlorn group gathered in the cafeteria for a very disappointing dinner. Thanksgiving had been bearable. A smaller holiday, with only two months since they had last seen their families. Now it was four months, and they were all wearing thin.

Dancer spent the morning Skyping his mom. This was the longest they had ever spent apart, the longest he had ever been away from home. Bird came in for a few minutes, then Shilo. They missed him, they wished him a merry Christmas, they would eat some mashed potatoes for him. It wasn’t enough, it wasn’t nearly enough, but he didn’t want to hold up their celebrations, so he said goodbye and snapped his laptop shut. When Cat came in, lacking some of her usual swagger, Dancer quickly swept her up into a hug.

“Sorry,” he whispered into her hair. He didn’t think she was big on feelings. She hugged him back with uncharacteristic warmness. 

They stayed like that for a beat too long before Cat said something along the lines of “the south fucking sucks” and Dancer laughed and they both stopped back a bit but now they could both see each other better. Now Cat could see those startlingly blue eyes and the sad smile he was wearing, now Dancer could see the dark under her eyes and examine the curve of her sharp eyebrows, now held in an uncommonly sympathetic pose.

They also held that position for a little longer than polite society would generally dictate. Dancer felt his eyes drawn to her in a way her didn’t feel like describing yet. Whatever it was, it was making his smile more genuine by the second.

Shit.

(He could think about that later.)

For now, Cat was settling into his chair and telling him her mom, and he was lounging on his bed and telling her about his cousin.  
“I think she had a thing with Han a while back, though.”

“Who hasn’t had a thing with Han Alister, honestly,” said Cat, expressing her disgust with a dramatic combination of a scoff and an eye roll.

“I know you were joking, but literally the only people I can think of who haven’t are lesbians. Myself included,” said Dancer with an odd little laugh.

“You’re kidding,” said Cat, leaning forward, eyes widening.

“I am not.”

“Well?”

“It wasn’t a big deal, we were like fourteen or fifteen and really, really bored.”

“Typical,” said Cat, leaning back in the chair and spinning around. “Why does this keep happening? He’s such a jerk!”

“Ah, he’s not all bad. And he is pretty hot, I’m not gonna lie.”

“You got me there, Dancey-Pants,” she said with a teasing glance. Dancer rolled his eyes. Classic Cat-and-Dancer banter, although a little moe subdued today. Their rhythm was so easy and comfortable it astonished Dancer to realize that they had only known each other for, what, two months? Two and a half? Was that really it? Maybe homesickness and Hanson Alister were just really good bonding topics. 

Returning to reality, Dancer saw that Cat was casually going through his things.

“Christ,” she said, exasperated in a fond way. “Have you ever considered not being, like, a huge nerd?”

“Unfortunately, my dear Cat, it’s not a choice. Coolness is something you are born with or without, and I seem to be lacking.”

“Nah, man, you’re cool. You’re just also a nerd. You can be both.”

“I’m glad you’re so accepting.”

“I bet you are, or you wouldn’t have any friends, since you’re a goddam nerd,” she said grimly. Dancer snorted lazily. She got up with a heavy sigh and plopped herself down next to him on the bed. 

“I will postulate again,” she said quietly, the sadness of their earlier conversation returning to her voice. “The south fucking sucks.” Dancer had the sudden urge to hold her hand, his fingers curling around hers before he had the chance to examine the feeling. She blinked at theirs hands, but didn’t move. Instead she settled herself onto his pillow.

“So let me tell you about my cousin,” she started. “She is absolutely crazy.” She talked for a while, absently.

Dancer felt at home for the first time since leaving Marisa Pines that September.

 

***

 

Cat was freaking out. She was also freaking out over the fact that she was freaking out. 

Okay, so Dancer held her hand. She hadn’t openly reacted, she didn’t want to make it weird, but that had really caught her off guard. Had it been a purely fond gesture? She had just said something sad, maybe he was just trying to comfort her.

Stop it, she scolded herself. You’re being weird. It was like that time when they had danced in his room. She had quietly panicked about that, too. Dancer was just nice like that, you’re were friends and he was being friendly. Stop making a big thing out of it.

She hurried along the slushy sidewalk. It was Boxing Day, she was coming back from picking up some discount chocolates at the grocery store. As she shuffled along, careful not to slip on the half-melted ice coating the concrete, she heard someone behind her call her name. She turned around to see Raisa very cautiously jogging to catch up with her, having one close call but quickly righting herself.

“What’s up, my dude?” she asked brightly. Cat gave a noncommittal grunt. Raise frowned. “What is it?” Cat made a vague noise. Raisa narrowed here eyes at her. “Okay… come back to Hampton with me. We can talk this out over some holiday treats.”

“Talk what out? Everything is fine.”

“Hampton is on the left. Let’s go,” she said, completely ignoring Cat. Cat sighed and followed her down the street.

“So let’s narrow it down,” said Raisa as they walked. “Family? School? Money?” Cat shook her head, only half paying attention. 

“Could it be… is it possible… relationships?” Cat paused. Raisa whirled around, looking delighted.

“Caterina Tyburn, are you telling me that you have relationship problems?” she asked, a slightly manic look in her eye. Cat did not reply. “Oh my god, I have to call Talia.”

“No, no, please don’t! She’ll never stop making fun of me!” cried Cat, lunging for Raisa’s phone.

“Okay,” said Raisa, slightly calmer but still with a crazed glint in her eye. “Okay, I won’t tell her. Yet.” Cat groaned. Raise began (carefully) running towards Hampton, desperate to talk about romance with Cat. 

They managed to both make it up to Raisa’s room without dying. Raise quickly took Cat’s bags from her, pulling out packages of cheap sweets and ushering Cat to the bed. Raisa pulled her chair up as close to the bed as she could get, resting her chin in her hands and staring at Cat with overloaded anticipation.  
“Hallie’s not gonna come in here, is she?”

“No, she’s hanging out with Pearlie, I think. You’re safe.”

Cat was still suspicious, but relaxed minutely. 

“Okay, I guess I’m doing this…” she said quietly to herself. “Okay, so, okay, so I think…” she paused, cringing at Raisa’s face. “I think I might… have a crush on Dancer?”

Raisa made a ridiculous excited sound. Cat scowled.

“Oh, man, this is possibly the best day of my life,” she said intensely.

“I’m glad you’re happy, but what about me? I have a crush on Dancer.”

“Completely understandable, honestly. Who wouldn’t have a crush on him?”

“Are you gonna tell Han you said that, or should I?” asked Cat. Raisa scoffed and ignored her.

“Okay… so you think you have a crush on Dancer? You’re not actually sure?”

“I mean… it’s just a pretty recent development, you know?” said Cat, feeling unsure of herself. Raise nodded.

“Okay. Any particular reason why you think this?” she asked, businesslike.

“I’ve just… been feeling different about him I guess? And at first I thought that I just didn’t like as much as before but I think I actually like him… too much,” attempted Cat, feeling overly warm. Raisa nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face. She looked as if she should be taking notes on a book and asking, “How does that make you feel?”

“Do you have any examples of when you felt like you might have a crush on him?”

“Uh…” started Cat, a little taken aback by her purposeful questioning. “A little while ago we were just hanging out and listening to some music and then we started dancing together? I don’t know, I think I was weird about it. It wasn’t a big deal.”

“Anything else?”

“Well, yesterday we were talking and it got kind of sad and… feelings-y… which it does more often with him than with anyone else? Any way we were lying on his bed and talking and then he just kind of,” Cat fumbled. “Held my hand. Like he just grabbed it and held it and we were just talking and he was just holding my hand. I don’t know.”

“Okay… honestly, Cat? It seems pretty reasonable if you felt weird about lying on his bed holding hands with him while talking about feelings.”

“I wasn’t uncomfortable with it, or anything. I just liked it… a lot,” she finished lamely.

“So what’s the issue? He held you hand, you liked him holding your hand…?”

“Cause it was…” Cat flailed her arms around, searching for a word. “Crush-y! It was romantic! It was feelings-y!” She dropped her arms with a sigh.  
“And what’s so bad about that?” asked Raisa earnestly.

“I don’t want to mess this up! Dancer… he’s probably the closest friend I’ve had in a long time, I don’t want to ruin it like…” Cat stopped.

“Oh,” said Raisa, a little quieter now.

“Yeah.”

“Cat, you know, romantic relationships don’t have to be such a big deal.”

“What do you mean?” Raisa shifted in her seat, not knowing where to start.

“So I know… I know your relationship with Han was kind of… intense?”

“You could say that,” said Cat. 

“And, from what I’ve gathered, so was your relationship with Velvet.” Cat didn’t reply. “So I just want you to know that you don’t have to have another relationship like that.”

“A relationship like what?” asked Cat, skeptical.

“A relationship that flies high and falls hard, that’s the most important thing in your life, that’s intense and all-out and doomed to fail. You can have a relationship that just… makes you both happy. You can have that with Dancer. Just see where it takes you.”

“Fuck, I don’t wanna get all feelings-y with you, too,” said Cat after a moment. Raise laughed.

“So, what do you think?” asked Raisa.

“We’ll see,” was all Cat offered. “Especially since that little speech was coming from you.”

“What about me?” asked Raisa, sounding a little offended. Cat made a disbelieving sound.

“Asks the girl who fucks her boyfriend 24/7,” she said with a laugh.

“I’m allowed to fuck my own boyfriend, Cat!” responded Raisa. The two laughed for a minute before returning to a more serious tone.

“I’m just worried… I mean, what if he doesn’t have a crush on me?” asked Cat, feeling twelve years old.

“Cat, he held your hand while lying his bed talking about feelings. I’m pretty sure even he knows that that’s a pretty romantic gesture.”

“Okay… okay yeah,” said Cat.

“Fantastic! Now let’s dig into these discount chocolates and get this party fucking started.” 

 

***

 

Dancer was freaking out. 

Okay, so he had held Cat’s hand on Christmas. It had been nice, but after a full day of analyzing every aspect of the interaction he wasn’t so sure of himself. It was entirely on impulse, a sudden urge to be closer to Cat. At the time he had been tired and sad and homesick and not really thinking of the repercussions.  
He had not spoken to Cat since then. Yes it had only been a day, but he grew more paranoid every hour that he had been weird, that that wasn’t okay, that she didn’t want to talk to him now. Holding hands was a pretty romantic gesture, right? Had that been romantic? He was pretty sure it had been. While it was not entirely intentional, he definitely did not mind. The issue was not whether he was okay with it, but whether Cat was. Did she not want to have a romantic relationship with him? Would she now be uncomfortable with him?

He was lying on his back on his bed, staring at the ceiling, having a minor crisis in complete silence. After a minute or two he realized that “romantic relationship”, this very clinical sounding term he had bee using, meant, like…. dating. He was considering dating Cat, which was more than a little daunting.  
Did it have to be, though? He hadn’t done a while lot of dating in high school, too focused on the actual school part of it to have an incredibly eventful social life, but the few romantic relationships he had had were pretty casual. Could it be like that with Cat? She definitely meant more to him than any of the people he had been with before, and she did seem to have a habit of dating intensely. And he didn’t want it to be casual, exactly, just… low stress? Like if they just kept on in their usual manner but with some kissing in between. That would be ideal.

Dancer sighed and rolled over to face the wall as Han walked in, chatting on the phone with someone. His little sister, probably.

“Okay, say hi to Mam for me. I love you. See you later,” he said before placing his phone on his nightstand. “You good, man?” Dancer shrugged. “Okay, well I need to go to the dean’s office about some stuff about my scholarship. See you later, okay?” Dancer waved and said something generic.

He lay in bed for who knows how long after Han left, quietly panicking about his status with Cat. Eventually it got to be too much, so he forced himself to sit up, pick up his phone, and type out a quick message to Cat, asking if she was doing anything tomorrow. The screen went dim a couple times before a typing bubble came up on Cat’s side of the conversation. Dancer tensed up in anticipation. The bubble disappeared. It reappeared for a second before disappearing again. He briefly considered never looking at his phone again and living the life of a wandering ascetic before a text finally appears.

Cat:  
Yes! Did you have anything specific in mind?

Dancer frowned. Perfect spelling? No abbreviations? Correct capitalization and punctuation? Who was this?

 

***

 

dancey pants:  
Am I texting the right person???

“Why did you take my fucking phone Raisa, what the fuck?” shouted Cat, grabbing desperately at Raisa

“You were never going to actually answer him, I had to do something,” she answered primly, handing her the phone. Cat opened it, typing in the passcode three times before getting it right. 

“Aww, man, he could tell! You text like a fucking nerd, I never would have said that!”

“You never would have said anything!” Raisa almost shouted. Cat groaned.

“Well what do I say now? Sorry, I went crazy and turned into a meddling private school brat for a minute?”

“That was uncalled for, Caterina.”

“Ugh, you sound like my mother!”

“And you still haven’t answered him!” Cat bit her lip and looked at the phone.

Cat:  
lol ya sorry  
raisa was on my phone and was replying to my texs for me  
but shes a fuckin nerd so

“Although insulting me was a little unnecessary, good save,” said Raisa from over her shoulder.

“Stop reading my texts,” said Cat automatically, staring at the bubble that had appeared in the corner of the screen with a dangerous intensity.

dancey pants:  
Oh lol ok  
I did not Have Anything Specific In Mind, Caterina  
Idk I just wanted to hang out??

Cat:  
ye ok  
ya im not doing anything  
wanna see a superhero movie or something

dancey pants:  
Yeah okay  
There’ll probably be one playing at that shitty theatre downtown

Cat:  
nice  
sounds good  
like noonish?

dancey pants:  
Yup  
See you then  
“Now, was that really so hard?” asked Raisa condescendingly.  
“Yes,” said Cat, aggressively locking her phone and putting it in her pocket.

 

***

 

Okay. It was fine. She was fine. They were fine. That was a totally normal conversation. Dancer breathed deeply, trying to calm himself down from that minor panic. It was fine. She was fine. They were fine.

 

JANUARY

“So, how’s that crush going?” asked Talia, dropping herself next to Cat at the cafeteria table some gloomy Wednesday. Cat startled.

“What do you mean?” she asked, wary.

“You can’t keep secrets from me, Cat,” she said threateningly. “I know something’s up, you’ve been acting weird, and Raisa’s not as subtle as she thinks.”

“Oh, hi Han!” said Cat, overly loud in attempt to shut Talia up. Talia narrowed her eyes at her.

“Hi?” replied Han, confused by her enthusiasm. Dancer followed not far behind him, taking his usual spot on the other side of Cat.

Shit.

This was basically the worst thing to ever happen to anyone ever, Cat figured. She liked him so much, but also she liked him so much; she wanted to spend time with him, but being with him was torture. She was not exaggerating. As helpful as Raisa had been, no amount of kind advice would give Cat the courage to actually do anything about her feelings. Fuck feelings, right? That had been her motto ever since Velvet, and she planned on sticking to it.

Dancer smiled at her (that sweet smile of his, where his eyes crinkle up so much they almost close) and gave a quick greeting, which Cat was fairly sure she returned. She couldn’t be positive though, not with the way he put his hair behind his ear. God, since when was she so distracted by him?'

“So, Valentine’s is coming up, right?” said Talia, clearly desperate for Cat to give her something.

“Yeah, in a month…?” said Han. 

“Well, you got any plans?” she replied, irritation coming off her like a bad smell.

“No? Since when do you care?” he asked suspiciously.

“I’m just asking, I’m sorry,” said Talia dramatically. “Dancer, what about you?”

“I don’t think so, why would I?” he answered, glancing quickly at Cat before returning to Talia. “Are you okay? Is there something up with you and Pearlie, or something?”

“No! You know what, just forget it,” she said. Cat snorted.

“Should have forgot it in the first place,” she teased under her breath. Talia glared. Dancer gave her a look, which she waved off.

“Okay… well how’s everyone’s schedule this semester?” asked Dancer. Everyone groaned.

Han launched in to a five page double-spaced one inch margin twelve point Times New Roman MLA format essay about his latest materials professor immediately, finishing it off with a scoff and an “anyways”. Talia whined about about her and Pearlie’s schedules conflicted four days a week. Dancer made a comment about how the workload was going to kill him soon. They all turned to Cat.

“Honestly? My semester’s not that bad,” she said honestly.

“Fuck you,” said Han before stuffing his mouth with a large wad of bread.

“Actually…” she stopped herself, not sure if she should continue. She cleared her throat. “Uh, one of my classes is putting on kind of a… recital thing, I guess? Anyway, I’m gonna be in it…”

“When is it? Oh my god, we should all go,” said Talia.

“The end of the month, the twenty somethingth… you honestly don’t have to come,” she said quickly.

“No, we’d love to come, Cat!” said Dancer with such an honest smile that Cat felt like crying.

“Kay, well there’ll be posters and stuff so if you wanna come just check those out, I guess.”

 

Talia spent the next week or so pestering Cat, hoping to get some tidbit about her alleged “crush”. She gravely underestimated Cat’s psychological endurance, and eventually gave up, complaining loudly to Pearlie about the whole situation. Pearlie apologized to Cat on behalf of Talia, thoroughly embarrassed by the whole situation. Cat told her it wasn’t her fault that Talia was such a pain, Pearlie sighed and asked her to refrain from insulting her girlfriend. Cat agreed on the condition that Talia stop pestering her about her love life, and so a truce was laid.

Cat struggled through the month, returning to school with a defeated resignation, whining daily about the weather, and desperately trying not to be weird around Dancer (and, as a result, being very weird around Dancer). With the holidays over there was nothing to look forward to, just the overcast sky bearing down on her mood and whittling away at her resolve. She was exhausted.

She found it difficult to return to normalcy with Dancer after that rather important revelation, and she more than once caught him looking at her with confusion, or maybe concern. Any physical contact now seemed charged, any eye contact significant, any conversation loaded. She had no idea if it was her imagination or if he, too, felt the tension between them, but either way it was killing her.

They sat side-by-side on a bus, on their way to a Mexican place Pearlie had mentioned the week prior. They both had an earbud in, listening to the most recent addition to Cat’s music library. It was nice in a quieter, softer way than Cat was used to. Like Dancer, she thought to herself before being immediately disgusted by how sappy and feeings-y that sounded. Who was she, Han?

“This is cool,” said Dancer, meaning the song.

“Yeah, I just found them last weekend,” replied Cat without looking up from her lap. “They’re from Fellsmarch, so that’s cool.”

“They don’t really seem like your usual style,” he noted, sounding oddly cautious.

“I’m a versatile person,” she said finally looking at him. She raised an eyebrow and tried to look derisive. He smiled and rolled his eyes and huffed through his nose in that little sarcastic way of his, which unfortunately resulted in her looking at him longer than she had intended. He raised his eyebrow, succeeding in looking derisive, and she looked back at her lap. She heard a quiet sigh from him, but she could not detect the source or the tone. She let herself forget about it.  
He turned to look out the window. She forced herself not to focus too much on his hands, currently folded neatly, almost primly, in his lap. They were dry, he rubbed them absentmindedly. They began to tap along with the song, drumming softly on his faded jeans with a casual air that Cat could not relate to.

“We’re gonna have to stop going out so much,” said Cat. Dancer looked at her sharply. “I mean, to places that cost money. I’m gonna run out soon.”

“Yeah, you’re right. So free shows and Value Village trips only, from now on?” he asked with a smile. Cat nodded. “Good thing you have me to be poor with. Poor Han only has his rich girlfriend to hang out with.”

“How is that a problem? She probably picks up the cheque all the time.”

“Yeah, and I don’t think Han’s ego is going to survive much longer,” he laughed. She laughed too. They looked at each other. They both stopped laughing.

 

***

 

The food was okay. What was not okay was Cat. She still chatted and quipped with him, but something was off. She held back too much, looked at him too closely, stumbled too often. He was fairly sure that this behaviour began after Christmas, and regretted grabbing her hand like that. As nice as it had been, it wasn’t worth their friendship. He wished they could go back to how it was before, or at least get all this crap out in the open and have it over with. It had been three weeks of this awkwardness and he was well past fed up.

The bus ride back was quiet, with even less conversation than on the way there. Cat put her music on shuffle, an interesting mix to say the least, and seemed ready to go to sleep. He wasn’t surprised after the sheer amount she had had for dinner, but was still impressed at her ability to nod off even as someone shouted in Japanese in her ear. As her consciousness faded, her head dropped onto his shoulder. Exploding sounded like a petty appealing option right then. He breathed deeply and forced himself to calm down, you were going to be chill about this, it’s not a big deal but found it more difficult than anticipated. He wanted to grab her hand, or put his cheek on top of her head, or stroke her hair or— fuck. Her mouth opened a little. He wanted to scream.

He nudged her awake as they neared their stop. She looked disoriented, blinking tiredly and furrowing her brow (cute)(fuck). She mumbled something that sounded like an apology and rushed to get off the bus. She didn’t speak on the way to their building. Or in the stairs. Or in the hall. The silence was decidedly not comfortable, and Dancer felt like he was in physical pain. They both arrived at Cat’s room irritated and uncomfortable but entirely at a loss over what they could do about it. They paused, her door partially open. Dancer took a breath.

“Why have things been so weird?” he blurted. Cat’s eye were wide. “Is it because of Christmas?” She didn’t answer. He kept going. “I’m sorry if I made things weird between us, it was stupid. Can we forget that it ever happened?”

Cat looked really upset now. Her sharp eyebrows were drawn up and she stared resolutely at the floor, biting her lip. Dancer tugged anxiously at his hair as he waited for her to respond.

“Dancer, I…” 

She inhaled deeply and exhaled shakily. She looked like she was going to cry. Dancer stepped forward, hoping to comfort her or something, but she stepped back, away from him. She retreated to her room and closed the door without saying anything. Dancer stood there a moment longer, feeling like he should do something, not knowing what to do. He turned and walked back to his room.

 

***

 

Cat slid down the door until her butt hit the floor. She waited for him to speak or knock, not knowing if she was hoping or dreading it. All she heard were his retreating footsteps. She put her face in her hands.

“What the fuck was that?” asked a bewildered voice from somewhere in the room. Cat looked up to see Talia sitting on Pearlie’s bed looking very casual.

“I thought… I thought Pearlie was out with Raisa and Hallie,” she said lamely.

“She is. I came here to grab some shit I left the other day. Good thing I did, too, because what the fuck?” 

Cat shrugged sadly. She curled into a ball and sighed. She didn’t know what to do about Dancer, but she did know that she did not want to talk about it with Talia.

“What happened on Christmas? Did you guys bang, or something?”

Cat made a face. God, the whole situation was so stupid. Of course Talia would assume something like that when Cat was being so dramatic about it. They had just held hands, that was it! And there they were, acting like it was actually a big deal. they had held hands. How fucking old were they? Cat groaned.

“Seriously, what’s wrong?” she asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

“It’s stupid.”

“Well, you look pretty upset about it.”

Cat glared at her. She threw up her hands. Cat sighed in resignation. She was gonna do it.

“Well, long story short, I…” she paused, knowing this would be admitting defeat after weeks of struggle. “I have a… a crush on Dancer.”

Talia squealed. Of course. Cat made a frustrated noise.

“Okay, sorry, sorry, serious. This is serious,” she said, trying desperately not to laugh. “Why is this serious?”

“Cause he’s my best friend? I’ve gone over this with Raisa already, and of course she said to, you know, follow my heart or whatever bullshit. Which clearly I did not do.”

“Clearly,” said Talia, unnecessary as always.

“Anyway, I’ve been super weird. And Dancer noticed. And I didn’t know what to do. So.”

“What happened on Christmas?”

“Ugh, it’s so stupid but on Christmas we were hanging out and we—“ Cat grimaced “—held hands like we’re in grade fucking five, but it was weird for me and I don’t know how I felt about and—“ Cat groaned again and fell over, now fully lying down on the floor. “Emotions!” she lamented loudly.

“I feel that one,” sympathized Talia. “It’s a good thing I have incredible good looks and a razor sharp wit on my side, so I easily wooed my lovely Pearlie—“  
“Oh my GOD could you shut up,” said Cat, only half serious. Talia laughed her deep, rough laugh.

“Okay, but you are being a baby about this,” said Talia. Cat whined. “Seriously! Right now? That was pretty rude! Dancer was trying to figure out what was up with you and was ready to take the blame, and you just shut him out.”

Cat rolled over so her face was pressed into the floor. It was uncomfortable, so she stayed there, like it was penance for ignoring Dancer. 

“You wanna know how I got with that beautiful slice of womanhood I call my girlfriend? How Han managed to score that rich little hottie he’s sleeping with?”

“Why are you describing them like that? That’s weird.”

“Because we weren’t fucking weenies, Cat. We actually told these girls that we wanted to date them. And guess what we’re doing now? We’re dating them.”  
“What if he doesn’t want to date me, though? Cause that’s the real issue, here.”

“What did I just say about being a fucking weenie…” Talia sighed. “Okay. Best case scenario: he also wants to date you. You ride off into the sunset together. Worst case scenario: he doesn’t want to date you. If he still wants to be friends, then great! I mean, it sucks that you can’t, like, kiss or whatever, but he’s still a great friend. If he doesn’t still want to be friends… then why would you want to be friends with someone like that? I don’t think Dancer would do that. He’s better than that.”

Cat was feeling emotions again, for, like, the millionth time that day.

“Talia,I really don’t want to do this.”

“Do you want to kiss Dancer?”

“…Yes.”

“Then, my friend, you have to do this.”

 

***

 

“Hey, so you going to Cat’s recital thing next week?” asked Raisa, sitting down to the lunch table. Cat had class and Han had fallen asleep in the library, but everyone else was present.

“I was going to, but I don’t know if she wants me there,” replied Dancer. Everyone exchanged looks.

“Uh… no you should go,” said Talia.

“Yeah, definitely,” said Raisa.

“She would want you to come,” said Pearlie.

“She would be really glad to see you there,” said Hallie.

“Okay…” said Dancer, looking between the four of them in mild confusion. “I guess I’ll go…?”

They all nodded and agreed excitedly. He gave them another look before focusing his attention on his pasta salad. It wasn’t bad.

“You really think she wouldn’t mind?”

 

“How fancy is it?” Dancer asked, holding the phone with his shoulder as he rifled through his limited selection of actually nice clothes.

“Uh… like kind of nice? Like, maybe, blazer level nice?” replied Talia from the other end of the line. “I dunno man, it’s not a fucking black tie event.”

“Whatever. What time are you getting there?”

“Probably like seven? Dude, you gotta calm down.”

“I am totally calm Talia, why do you think I’m not calm?” asked Dancer. He pulled on his one and only blazer and began wondering what he should do with his hair. Talia laughed.

“I know things have been weird with Cat, but trust me, it’ll be fine. Okay, I gotta go, Pearlie’s talking to me about something. See you there!”

Dancer huffed and put his phone in his back pocket. he turned to the mirror and started to braid his hair, complaining to himself all the while. It’ll be fine. As if. What does she know? Cat will still be weird she’ll never stop being weird and those two months of happiness will be the only remembrance of happiness and friendship I’ll ever have.

Was he being dramatic? Possibly. Did he care? Absolutely not.

“Well,” he said to himself sadly. “At least your hair will look nice as she breaks your heart beyond repair.” He thought vaguely that he should pick up some flowers. That’s what you give performers, right?

 

He arrived a few minutes before everyone else and productively spent the whole time tapping his foot nervously and compulsively checking his phone every fifteen seconds. He was beyond relieved when Talia and Pearlie arrived, followed shortly by Hallie (Han had an appointment with the dean again and Raisa had an essay due the following day, so they were not in attendance). They walked into the auditorium surrounded by a swarm of chatter and the vague scent of weed.  
“These fucking arts students will get high for anything,” said Hallie disapprovingly.

“Probably the only way can make through shows like these,” teased Talia, earning an elbow in the ribs from Pearlie.

They took their seats awkwardly, not entirely sure what to expect. Cat had been scant in the details. The lights dimmed and the curtains opened.

Okay, so it was a student production, which meant spotty audio equipment and the occasional pitchy solo, but overall it was not bad. They had just suffered as a soprano fell very flat on the final note of her song, applauding politely and trying not to cringe, when Cat appeared on stage. She was wearing something white and floaty that perched delicately on her shoulders, completely unlike Cat herself in that respect. Although she did not have quite the stage presence as her peers, she more than made up for it with talent. The audience seemed to be holding their breath (or maybe it was just Dancer) as she placed her feet over the pedals and fingers over the keys. She paused momentarily.

Cat began playing like rain began falling. Dancer knew that she had studied and practiced for years, but her movements seemed effortless, like she was making this up on the spot. She easily convinced the audience that she had been born for the sole purpose of playing that song on that stage. When she finished here was a pause. Like everyone hoped that this wasn’t it, like there should have been more. Once they were released from her spell an incredible applause broke out, the thunder to Cat’s rain.

They met with Cat at the stage door after the show, full of congratulations and hugs. Dancer held back a little, still not convinced that she wasn’t mad at him. Hallie noticed him and made a vague excuse to leave. Talia and Pearlie quickly followed suit, leaving Cat and Dancer alone for the first time since he had tried to acknowledge their bizarre tension. They stood in the dim light of a street lamp a little ways away from the theatre like two losers who didn’t know how to talk to each other.

He shyly offered her the bundle of peonies he had picked up on the way there. She took them from him gingerly and uttered a quiet thanks.

“You did a fantastic job,” he tried. “Blew everyone away.” 

She smiled a small smile. Her eyes turned down to the ground. She was wearing an old black hoodie on top of the dress now, making her look much more like Cat than before.

“Look, about this whole thing…” he started.

“Don’t,” she said quickly. “I mean…” she winced. “I’m sorry about a little while ago. After the Mexican place? That was really rude, I’m sorry.”

Dancer nodded. They both knew that she wasn’t really addressing the issue.

“And… well,” she took a very deep breath. Steadied herself. Dancer mentally prepared himself for the worst. “The reason I’ve been so… weird is because I— I —like you in a romantic way.” The last was said very quickly, her eyes screwed shut like a kid confessing to stealing.

Dancer stood in complete silence for a very long moment.

“What?” he said stupidly.

Cat opened her eyes and glared at him.

“I like you romantically,” she repeated angrily. He continued to stare for a beat or two. Then his face broke into a grin.

“Seriously?”

“Yes, jackass. You gonna offer your opinion on that, or keep acting like a dick?” 

Dancer laughed. Of course Cat would say it like that.

“Well my opinion on that would be thank God, because was getting a little worried there.”

“You’re still not being entirely clear.”

“What I’m saying is that the feeling is mutual, my guy.”

“Oh,” breathed Cat. “Oh!” She laughed. “That’s great!”

“Does this mean I can hold your hand?”

“Yes. You have indefinite permission to hold my hand,” she said. They wandered back to the dorm in the unseasonably warm air, both feeling immensely lighter than they had two minutes previously.

“That’s a nice dress, I’ve never seen it before,” he said, swinging their hands.

“Uh, yeah, it’s Annamaya’s, she let me borrow it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, she’s not all bad. Just weird about sex.” The unspoken implication of that made them both go quiet for a second.

“Well… good thing this was a free show, right? Otherwise I probably couldn’t have come,” teased Dancer, bringing them back to comfortable affection.  
When they arrived at Cat’s dorm they found it empty. Neither of them doubted that that was on purpose.

“So, uh…” Cat chewed her lip. “Do you wanna come in?”

“Sure.”

They sat on Cat’s bed, not entirely sure where to go or how to act now.

“Do you wanna, like, kiss?” suggested Dancer after two excruciating minutes.

“God, yes.”

 

***

 

“Cat!” 

The voice pierced violently into Cat’s very happy cocoon of warmth. She groaned in response.

“Cat!”

The voice returned, sounding more urgent than before. She lifted her head marginally, cracking open her eyes to see Pearlie standing over her bed wringing her hands. Cat lifted herself up on her arms.

“What’s up?”

“Okay, Cat, you know I’m very happy for you, but Annamaya is coming very soon and you need to get your boy out of your bed.”

OH. Oh. Cat turned her head to see a rather shirtless Dancer in her bed. She looked down at herself and realized that she was, in fact, wearing his shirt.  
“Okay, okay,” she said pulling herself out of her very nice bed and putting her feet on the cold January floor. She nudged Dancer awake and quickly explained the situation as she looked for Annamaya’s dress, hoping nothing had happened to it after it was tossed to the floor. Surprisingly, she found it on a hanger on the end of her bed.

“Did you do that?” she asked Dancer, who was putting his blazer under the bed and glancing around the room for somewhere to hide.

“Huh? Oh, yeah.”

“That’s so thoughtful,” she smiled, honestly touched.

“Okay guys, I know this is very new, but…” warned Pearlie.

“Right, right. Uh, closet?” asked Cat.

“No, man, she almost caught Talia a little while ago, I think she’s catching on.”

“Shit,” she said under her breath.

“Window?” asked Dancer, grabbing Cat’s hoodie.

“Would you?” she asked with an apologetic smile.

He slid up the glass and popped out the screen before climbing out. He waved at them before disappearing onto the ledge.

“I hope he didn’t just fall to his fucking death,” said Cat after a moment. Pearlie snorted.

Annamaya knocked on the door seconds later.

“Hey, girls!” she said, gliding into the room. “How’s it going? How did your recital go, Cat?”

“It was fine,” Cat replied awkwardly.

“It was amazing,” exclaimed Pearlie. “She was easily the best one there.”

Annamaya beamed.

“Oh and, uh, thanks for the dress. I didn’t really have anything that suited the event.”

“No problem at all! You know I’m here for you guys,” she said fondly. Cat and Pearlie nodded a little uncomfortably at the sudden show of affection.

“Well, just checking in, you know. Have to make sure you girls aren’t getting up to anything unsavoury,” she said, wandering around the room. She opened and closed the closet doors and peaked briefly under their beds. She smiled at them, pleased with the results of her inspection.

“R-right…” said Cat with a quick glance at her roommate.

“See you gals later!”

The two ‘gals’ waved back nervously and did not breathe until she was well away from their room.

“You’d better get Dancer in here before he freezes to death,” said Pearlie, a giggle in her voice.

Cat rushed to the window and flung it open, helping Dancer back inside.

“Sorry about that,” she offered.

“No biggie,” he replied with a peck on the cheek. Cat got all warm and flustered and Pearlie rolled her eyes.

“Who’s disgusting now?” she muttered under her breath. Neither of them even noticed her leaving. They returned to Cat’s bed.

“Hey, turn around.” Dancer obliged. She took the ties from his hair and combed through it with her fingers, slowly working out the few tangles she encountered.

“Man, your hair is nice,” she breathed. Dancer smiled. She carefully rebraided his hair with the delicate hands she used to play piano. She gave one a final tug before letting him turn back around.

“Pretty cool that I can just, like, kiss you now,” said Dancer with amazement in his voice. He leaned over and kissed her to punctuate his point. She smiled against his mouth.

“Good thing I dropped my fucking bong that one time, right?”

“Han honestly never would have introduced us neither of us had brought it up.”

“Thank god for my drug habits,” she said and they were both laughing and kissing and hugging and the sun was shining and Cat felt comfortable with Dancer, in his gaze and in his arms and in his shirt, than she had felt with anyone else before.

“I am really glad I met you,” he said quietly, earnestly. She kissed him to let him know she felt the same.

**Author's Note:**

> this was my first fic, thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed, constructive criticism is welcome!
> 
> also whoops I did Canadian thanksgiving, don't really feel like changing that


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